130 TRANSACTIONS OP ROYAL SCOTTISH ARBORICULTURAL SOCIETY. 



singly as isolated trees or else merely in small knots and 

 patches. 



No situation is better fitted for growing ash for profit than 

 the sides of moist dells and chines having a good, strong, 

 loamy or clayey soil, through which the moisture from above 

 gradually percolates. This is much better than stagnating 

 subsoil moisture, which is even detrimental unless a full, 

 hot, southern exposure stimulate to evaporation and strong 

 transpiration through the leaves ; and even in dells and hollows 

 on the hill-sides the best and largest trees will usually be 

 found in the lowest and most sheltered positions, where the 

 soil is richest. 



Hitherto, in Britain, the ash has chiefly been grown as a 

 hedge-row tree. Here it secures complete exposure to light and 

 air, while its toughness ensures it against being thrown or broken 

 by wind. But in such positions it is apt, when advancing in 

 age, to throw out long, superficial roots, which spread into the 

 fields, rob the soil of moisture and of nutrients otherwise avail- 

 able for the agricultural crops, and interfere with the action of 

 the plough. Moreover, in such completely isolated situations 

 there is an excessive tendency to ramification and coronal de- 

 velopment. This not only diminishes the total quantity of 

 useful timber produced, but also very materially affects the 

 elasticity upon which the technical value of the bole mainly 

 depends. 



If grown upon purely economical principles, the proper position 

 of the ash is that of a subordinate tree in woods consisting of a 

 matrix of other trees of somewhat slower growth, and better able 

 to protect the soil against deterioration. On hill-sides it may 

 well be planted near small water-courses, whilst on good, but 

 rather moist, low ground it can be grown remuneratively along 

 with oak, elm, sycamore, and maple, or even with willows and 

 alder, on land of a wet description. When associated with 

 the oak on fresh soil, where they often greatly improve the 

 growth of the woods, ash, sycamore, etc., should be cut 

 out about the sixtieth to seventieth year, in order that 

 under-planting may take place, unless a sufficiency of stools, 

 stool-shoots, and other underwood obviates the usual necessity 

 for this. 



As a standard tree in copse, the ash finds conditions well 

 suited to its essential requirements. Here it develops a much 



