PERIODICAL LITERATURE. 



FOREST GEOGRAPHY AND DESCRIPTION. 



Of the 368,000 acres of forest on the 

 Forests island over half is commercial, less than 



of a fifth private forest, and 30 per cent is 



Corsica. State Forest (French) and under good ad- 



ministration, accessible by excellent road 

 systems constructed during the last 50 years. Neger enthuses 

 particularly over the coniferous mountain forest. From the sea- 

 shore to about 3000 feet the characteristic Mediterranean tree 

 flora, called macchia, prevails, composed of a variety of broadleaf 

 trees and shrubs of little economic value. This is followed by 

 a narrow belt of open chestnut forest, Castanca vesca — the chest- 

 nut and olive being the most important food trees of the island, 

 hence this region having the densest population — sometimes up to 

 4000 feet, old veterans of over 1000 years old being not rare. 

 Above the chestnut zone, up to 4500 feet, the conifer forest ex- 

 tends, while strange to say the timberline is formed by a broadleaf 

 forest, in which the beech (up to 100 feet high) is the dominant 

 species and Abies pectinata its concomitant with Betula verrncosa, 

 Alnus cordata, Ilex aquifolium. Neger explains this peculiar, un- 

 expected distribution by the absence on the island of the northern 

 timberline conifers, the coniferous forest below being made up of 

 the Mediterranean species Pinus pinaster and P. corsicana with 

 Abies pectinata. The pines show a magnificent development, 

 diameters going sometimes up to 5 feet and heights to over 150 

 feet. The two pines are not easy to dififerentiate without cones 

 except by habitus, the Corsican pine remaining pyramided to old 

 age and presenting a clear bole, the Pinaster pine assuming a 

 rounded crown and remaining branchy. Seed production is very 

 plentiful hence natural regeneration easy. Although the stands 

 appear a picture of health, fungi are not absent, and mistletoe is 

 sometimes unusually developed. 



Die Bergwalder Korsikas. Naturw Zeitschrift fiir Forst-und Land- 

 wirtschaft. April, 1914, pp. 153-161. 



