DIVISION OF FORESTRY. 215 



Regard to tlie preservation of favorable soil conditions, wliicli suf- 

 fer by often repeated clearing, requires the planting of new stocks 

 where old ones have failed. Mixed growth, as everywhere, gives the 

 best results. Oaks, walnut, hickory, chestnut, elm, maplus, birch, 

 cherry, linden, catalpa, and the locust also, with its root-sprouting 

 habit, can be used for such purpose. 



If, when cutting off the sprouts, at the age of from ten to twenty 

 years, some trees are left to grow to larger size, thus combining the 

 coppice with timber forest, a management results which the Gfermans 

 call ''Mittelwald," and which we may call 



STANDARD COPPICE. 



This is the method of management which, in our country, deserves 

 most attention, especially in the Western prairie States, where the 

 production of fire-wood and timber of small dimensions is of first im- 

 portance, but the production by the farmer of larger and stronger 

 timbers at the smallest cost should not be neglected. The advan- 

 tages of this method of management, combining those of the coppice 

 and of the timber forest, are : 



(1) A larger yield of wood per acre in a short time. 



(3) A better quality of wood. 



(3) A production of wood of valuable and various dimensions in 

 the* shortest time with hardly any additional cost. 



(4) The possibility of giving closer attention to the growth and re- 

 quirements of single individuals and of each species. 



(5) A ready and certain reproduction. 

 (6) 



The possibility of collecting or using for reforestation, in addi- 

 tion to the coppice stocks, the seeds of the standards. 



If, instead of the pure walnut plantations which have sprung up in 

 the Western States, such plantations had been started on the stand- 

 ard coppice plan, not only would more efficient " self-supporting '* 

 forest plantations have been secured, at less cost, but also quicker 

 and better results would have been attained. The under-wood or cop- 

 pice-wood of inferior kinds could have been cheaply procured, and 

 therefore more densely planted, without much extra cost, thus quickly 

 furnishing the necessary shade to the soil, and in a short time yield- 

 ing desirable fire-wood, and again sprouting to cover the soil. Then 

 the walnut or other valuable standards would have been permitted 

 to grow on, bearing fruit, and forming, under the infi.uence of en- 

 larged access of light, stouter though shorter timber, of greater value, 

 without losing the needed protection of their foot-cover. 



The objections to this mode of treatment are the production of 

 branches on the standards when freed from the surrounding growth, 

 and the fact that the standards act more or less injuriously on the 

 under-wood which they overtop. 



The first objection can be overcome to a certain extent by pruning, 

 and the second by proper selection and adjustment of coxjpice-wood 

 and standards. The selection of standards — which should preferably 

 be seedlings, as coppice-shoots are more liable to deteriorate in later 

 life — must be not only from such species as by isolation will grow 

 into more useful timber, but, if possible, from those which have thin 

 foliage, thus causing the least injury by their cover to the under- wood. 

 The latter should of course be taken from those . kinds that will best 

 endure shade. Oaks, ashes, maples, locust, honey-locust, larch, bald 

 cypress, a few birches, and perhaps an occasional aspen, answer well 



