Periodical Literature. 317 



The spruce is now introduced using transplants and setting four 

 feet apart. The beech must have a start by some fifteen years in 

 order that some individuals may persist until maturity. In plant- 

 ing the spruce, groups of beech are left to grow up free from 

 competition with the spruce. The location of these groups will 

 be somewhat irregular since they will be selected to include the 

 most promising parts of the young beech stand. Their size will 

 vary from two to twenty-five square rods with an interval between 

 of four to six rods. 



Polewood forests of beech can best be changed to the spruce- 

 beech mixture by waiting until they are capable of natural re- 

 generation. When oak occurs in mixture with beech it is removed 

 in the first thinning of the mature stand. In pure stands of oak 

 which are to be changed to spruce-beech mixture beech mast or 

 beech seedlings must be supplied. 



Hoffman, B. E. Erschcint es rdtlich. . .schlechte Laubholsbestdnde auf 

 flachgrundigen. . .Boden in reine F i chtenhe stand e umsuivandeln? Bilva. 

 Dec, 191 1. Pp. 391-2; 399-400; 407-409. 



The rich iron ores of the WestphaHan 

 Forestry mountains, lying in a wooded country from 



Combined which the charcoal for their reduction was 



ivith readily drawn, were responsible for the 



Farming. early industrial development of the region. 



The population was soon greater than the 

 agricultural lands could furnish with bread and so it came about 

 that between each rotation of sixteen to eighteen years in the cop- 

 pice stands the land was planted to rye. The demand for charcoal 

 has now greatly fallen ofif (F. Q. Vol. IX, p. 141), and the popu- 

 lation too has decreased. But it is still large enough to tax the 

 fertility of the sterile soil under the unpropitious climate so that 

 coppice management still persists, not because justified in itself — 

 which it is not — ^but because the short rotation permits the use of 

 the land for grain every sixteen to eighteen years. The effect of 

 this is to increase the area of agricultural land by 12^%. 



The coppice, excepting the oak, is cut in winter. In May and 

 June when the cambium is active the bark is loosed from the oak 

 and left hanging, attached by the upper end. When dry the bark 

 is gathered, tied in bundles and carried to market. The standing 

 wood is then removed before the first of August. The soil is then 



