4:u 



'rill- JoiKNAI. (11" HKRHDITN' 



seed from a rej^ion of higher mean 

 temperature is most affected, since the 

 long, willowy, previous year's growth is 

 easily forced out of shape, becoming a 

 cripple if not actually broken. Because 

 of the longer jjeriod of growth these 

 seedhngs are also more liable to damage 

 through earl\- and late frosts. These 

 facts are now generally accej^ted by 

 German foresters and, in mountainous 

 regions, it is common to find a forest 

 nursery for each 500 feet of elevation, 

 the object being to collect the seed and 

 grow the seedlings under conditions 

 common to that general elevation. The 

 suggestion has been made that the 

 nursery should be at a high cle\^ation, 

 yet this is considered as impracticable 

 as ha\'ing it at a low elevation. In one 

 case the rate of growth is too slow; in 

 the other, the susceptibility of damage 

 and destruction is too great. 



Certainly these facts should have a 

 very great influence in the selection of 

 seed, yet the contrary seems the rule. 

 Commercial seed is collected, not always 

 from the best formed and most \'igorous, 

 but often from the deformed and 

 dwarfed; simply because the inferior 

 specimens often produce the heaviest 

 crops of seed and this seed is more 

 accessible to the collector. With the 

 same faulty method of reasoning the 

 lumbermen, and often the Forest Ser- 

 vice, leave the deformed, the cripples 

 anfl the weeds to ]>ro\nde for the new 



forest. Carden and field seeds are being 

 constanth' imj^rovcd through selection 

 and the various State Exijcriment 

 Stations have undertaken an insjjection 

 of seed handled b\' the large dealers, so 

 that the ]jurchaser may have some 

 guarantee of cleanliness and jjurity. 

 With tree seed, however, nothing but 

 cleanliness is considered, the character 

 of the parent trees being entirely 

 ignored. Even in work performed by 

 the Forest Service the object has been, 

 too often, "cheap" seed, rather than 

 from the "best" trees. Collecting seed 

 of the trees of a forest indiscriminately 

 is on a ])ar with selecting seed com as it 

 comes from the sheller. As a matter of 

 fact the selection of tree seed to repro- 

 duce a forest is j^erhaps more important 

 than the selection of seed grain to pro- 

 duce a field of grain, since the profit- 

 ability of forestry is dependant to so 

 great an extent upon rate of growth and 

 length of rotation. While it may not 

 be possible to have a "seed plot" as in 

 corn growing, it is certainly possible 

 and practicable to gather seed from well- 

 formed, vigorous, rapid-growing indi- 

 viduals only — always bearing in mind 

 that the characteristics desired in the 

 new forest must be present, to a large 

 extent, in the individual parent trees 

 from which the seed is selected. Only 

 to a comparatively small extent can 

 the defects of ]joor seed be overcome 

 through cultivation. 



