96 JOURNAL OF FORESTRY 



Field Planting 



Planting should be done as early in spring as the ground permits. 

 New shoots must not be allowed to develop on pine stock to be planted. 

 For late planting it is considered advisable to take up the stock in a 

 dormant state and to place it in cold storage. "Spruce and fir plants 

 may in necessity be planted even after starting to grow." 



The planting tool in common use is a sort of long-handled dibble, 

 with a rounded steel or iron-shod point. When forced perpendicu- 

 larly into the ground it makes a hole 6 to 7 cm. in diameter, which is 

 wide enough to insure getting the roots properly arranged. Previously 

 a smaller, sharper-pointed bar had been used, giving a funnel-shaped 

 hole which had to be widened by working the handle of the bar from 

 side to side. This has resulted in pockets being formed around the 

 roots, which could not be filled properly. Moreover, because of the 

 small hole, "the planter has not been able to see how the roots were 

 accommodated in the hole and has worked blindly, and the very shape 

 of the hole hindering the self-adjustment of the roots, they have often 

 been crooked. Frequently, especially when the roots were long, the 

 root tips have been caught near the ground surface and root placed in 

 the hole doubled up." An unnatural placing of the roots causes very 

 considerable losses of pine stock after field planting. 



Besides the planting tool, each planter is provided with a wooden 

 basket-like container for filling-earth, "a gunny sack for covering the 

 plants," and a ball-pointed, wooden tamper for packing the soil around 

 the roots. "Each laborer engaged in digging, preparing, and transport- 

 ing filling-earth requires a spade, carrying yoke, and two galvanized 

 buckets. The filling-earth used should not frost-heave badly and 

 should contain some woods-mold ashes, or bog mire. If suitable soil 

 is lacking on the area, it can be hauled in and piled at convenient points. 

 From 0.5 to 0.7 liters of earth are needed per plant hole. The foreman 

 of the crew deals out the stock to the planters." 



Planting Stock 



2-0 pine and 3-0 spruce-fir stock is used. The practice of dipping 

 the roots in a mixture of water, wood mulch, sand, and clay, after tak- 

 ing them from the seed bed, is said to protect them against drying-out 

 and to permit them to be placed more readily in the planting hole. 

 However, on sites where frost-heaving is feared and where the roots 

 should be well spread out "unpuddled plants must be used." When 

 the stock is lifted from the seed bed, the strongest plants of best color 

 and bud development are sorted out and put in bunches of 100 plants 



