36 TRANSACTIONS OF ROYAL SCOTTISH ARBORICULTURAL SOCIETY. 



been calculated in connection with the present Plan. But, as might 



be anticipated, a great deal of injury is done in places; and if the 



young crops are to be efficiently protected without resort to wire 



netting, strenuous efforts on the part of the gamekeepers must be 



sustained. The plantations in parts of which serious damage was 



noticed are the following, viz.: — Blackrock Corner, Assynt West 



Belts, Contullich Belt, Contullich Wood, Toll Belt, Black Park, 



Temple Park, the Old Nursery, Dalreoch, Cnoc-an-Eiliknaidli, 



Badger Hill, Evanton Wood, Assynt Hill and Cnoc-na-Croige. 



In some places, notably in Blackrock Corner, Assynt West Belt, 



Assynt Lower Belt and Contullich Belt, even the largest of the 



larches, eleven or twelve years old, have been freshly gnawed by 



rabbits; and it does not seem improbable that the wounds thus 



made may expose the attacked trees to the dreaded disease. 



Some plants have been cut down by hares in Ardoch Wood and 



Blarvorich, while roe-deer and blackgame have done serious damage 



in places. 



Other Sources of Injury. 



Spring and autumn frosts, as previously stated, cause occasional 

 damage to young crops, but on the whole this is not usually of a very 

 serious nature. 



Of insects, those most to be feared are the Pine Weevils (Hylobius 

 abietis or Pissodes notatus), which have attacked crops from one to 

 four years old in Cnoc-na-Croige, Black Park, Bullockeshan, Con- 

 tullich Wood, Evanton Wood, Blarvorich and Cnoc Fyrish ; the 

 Pine Shoot Moth (lietinia resinella) is also doing considerable 

 damage in Bullockeshan; and the Pine Beetle (Hylurgus piniperda) 

 injures both young and old Scots fir on many parts of the estate, — as, 

 for example, in Claisdruim, Cnoc Duchaire, Contullich Wood and 

 Lealty Belt. Measures to meet these attacks must be taken, nut 

 only by the destruction of the insects, or of their eggs or larvae, in 

 the manner suggested in volume iv. of Schlich's "Manual of 

 Forestry," but, especially as regards the weevils, by selecting the 

 felling-areas of successive years in such a way as to enable the 

 new crop on each such area to attain the age of four or five years 

 before the crop adjoining it is felled and the ground restocked. 



The young silver Jirs are badly attacked by disease. In Allt Duack 

 some trees of this species, six or seven years old, which threw out 

 fine shoots last year, are now very unhealthy looking, the stem and 

 branches being covered with plant-lice and some of the terminal 

 shoots being dead. Silver firs of like age in Fyrish Lower Belt are 

 also showing similar signs of failure; and the same phenomenon has 



