Current Literature. 61 



book in Professor Mayr's novel proposition of silvicultural man- 

 agement — the "small stand" management. 



The principle of this management is to break away, both from 

 the uniformity of the pure stands under clearing system which, 

 while financially the best, are inviting dangers to stand and soil, 

 and from the selection forest, which, while most conservative of 

 soil conditions, is financially the poorest, and also from the mixed 

 forest in regeneration system under nurses, group or otherwise, 

 with long periods, which the author contends, have proved fail- 

 ures. He substitutes a form of mixed forest, in which each 

 species appears in small stands of from three-fourths to eight or 

 ten acres in extent, each of these enlarged groups or clumps of 

 pure forest to be managed by itself, with a thinning practice 

 which in the 40 to 50 year makes underplanting for soil cover 

 desirable. 



The reproduction, after having been once established by plant- 

 ing is to be done by shelterwood system within the small stand, 

 which, under such management would permit a regeneration in 

 five to six years, removing the main difficulties of natural regener- 

 ation, also securing the safety against the various kinds of dam- 

 age for which the mixed forest is noted, and at the same time 

 securing the greater financial efficiency of the pure forest. 



The author, claiming the general applicability of this method, 

 expounds : "In the American forest with its large number of 

 species the small stand forest may be found the best form for 

 preserving the important species, and to reproduce and grow 

 them. Where thinnings (or improvement cuttings) would be 

 necessary to preserve desirable species in competition against 

 overpowering weed species, it may not be possible to apply the 

 method because of the extensive areas involved, the large amount 

 of weed trees left, the unsaleableness of the material, the high 

 wages. Here only the pure stand resulting from clearings fol- 

 lowed by planting solves the problem, (an attitude which we may 

 as well subscribe to for many of our culled mixed forests !). The 

 small stand management reduced the pure stand to the size bio- 

 logically admissible, assures the preservation of the valuable 

 species, and permits the needed thinnings, etc." 



We hope to return to a fuller and more critical discussion of 

 this most meritorious work at a later occasion. B. E. F. 



