Some Aspects of European Forestry. 137 



of that time. Hence, only the treatment of stands of the first and 

 second periods is dealt with in detail in the plan of cutting. 



The stands of pine are divided into five arbitrary site classes, 

 according to the yield : Site I, up to 102,000 feet board measure 

 per acre; Site II, up to 85,000; Site III, up to 68,000; Site IV, up 

 to 51,000; Site V, under 34,000 feet board measure per acre. 



These volumes include all wood over 2.76 inches in diameter. 



In actual practice, the schematic step-like arrangement of the 

 age classes, decreasing in height (and age) towards the prevailing 

 wind direction, is never adhered to, nor can it ever be. How- 

 ever, it does present a definite, tangible ideal, nor is a sustained 

 cmnual yield attempted, but merely a periodic one. 



The great dividing points in the management of pine in Prussia 

 are: First: Whether the object of management should be a 

 financial one — greatest net income — or a silvicultural one — 

 greatest production of wood. Second : Whether the system of 

 management should be one of pure stands and clear cutting, or of 

 mixed stands and shelterwood cutting. 



The former was settled (?) by an ex cathedra utterance of the 

 Minister of Agriculture, Domains and Forests to the eflfect that: 

 "The Prussian Forest Administration does not consider itself 

 decreed to practice a narrow financial management of the Forests, 

 much less one based on capital and interest, rather the Adminis- 

 tration considers itself bound to handle the Forests as a trust 

 fund of the nation in such a way that the present may have the 

 largest yields and benefits possible from the Forests, but without 

 in any way impairing, but rather wherever possible increasing, the 

 yields and benefits from the Forests for future generations." 



The latter point is still a moot one, but the tendency is strongly 

 away from pure stands and clear cuttings and towards mixed 

 stands, leaving some of the old stand as shelter to the new. 



G. L. Hartig at the end of the eighteenth century preached in 

 favor of shelterwood cuttings and natural regeneration by shelter- 

 wood methods. His influence was very powerful during the first 

 half of the nineteenth century, but gradually the methods of 

 clear cutting, chiefly in strips with either natural or artificial re- 

 generation, grew in popularity. As Borggreve points out in his 

 polemic volume ''Die Holzzucht,"* the evident advantages of in- 



*"Die Holzzucht" by Professor Dr. Bernhard Borggreve, 2d. Edition, 

 Paul Parey, Berlin, 1891, pp. 186 and 187. 



