NURSERY PRACTICE IN PENNSYLVANIA 763 



in the hands of various American and French dealers. All the seed 

 bought is carefully tested by the Silvicultural Department at the Forest 

 Academy. Either the Steiner Keimplatte, or a dirt test, or both, are 

 used. The latter is much more accurate for nursery work and shows 

 an error of lo per cent or less. The former is more valuable as testing 

 the freshness and general viability by observation of the germinative 

 force. 



The writer has found that one of the most commonly neglected, but 

 essential, conditions of economical work is the careful subdivision of 

 the nursery. In the Mont Alto Nursery there are about 1,200 beds of 

 100 square feet each. Of these about 400 are sown each year. This 

 number of beds requires 2,000 screens and 5,600 stakes. To move these 

 any considerable distance is a time-consuming and expensive operation. 

 To reduce such work to the minimum, the nursery is divided into three 

 working sections. Each working section contains three units. One 

 unit of each working section is to contain one-year-old stock, one two- 

 year-old stock, and the third a soiling crop. Screens and stakes are 

 placed in a reserved space central to the working section. The short 

 25-foot bed is preferred by two nurseries ; a bed about twice as long is 

 used in the others. At Mont Alto I am using alternate two and five 

 foot paths to save transportation costs. Three- foot aisles are used in 

 the other nurseries. Eighteen-inch paths are used in all. 



In the Mont Alto Nursery fall sowing predominates ; in the others 

 spring sowing. Up to this time only red and white pine have been fall- 

 sown here. Two-year seedlings from fall-sown beds are nearly equal 

 to average three-year-olds. The quantity of seed necessary is greatly 

 reduced in fall sowing. Sixteen ounces of average white-pine seed is 

 rather too heavy for 100 square feet. Six ounces of red pine is suffi- 

 cient. There is no loss from damping-off in fall-sown beds ; the only 

 serious loss is from birds in spring after germination starts. A small 

 army of boys is necessary to keep the birds off the beds. 



In the Greenwood Nursery the beds are thrown up by the plow and 

 then raked down. At Mont Alto the ground is carefully harrowed and 

 worked and shallow paths made by spading. The depth of the path in 

 the different nurseries depends on the soil and the drainage. Heavy 

 soil demands a deej^er path ; also deeper paths are needed where surface 

 drainage is the rule. 



After sowing at Mont Alto the soil is covered by a mixture of sand 

 and compost ; at Greenwood by a mixture of compost and charcoal 

 screenings. Both methods give admirable results and eliminate caking. 

 Pine needles arc, in general, favored f(->r covering the bed. They lie 



