PLAN FOR BLACKMOOR, BRADSHOTT, AND TEMPLE WOODS. 203 



(averaging only 8\- acres) to be dealt with each year ; but con- 

 siderations regarding the overwood, the underwood, and the 

 maintenance of the productivity of the soil all militate against the 

 fixation of any lower period of rotation. As, however, the vast 

 majority of the trees now forming the standards have short boles, 

 not capable of being improved so much in financial value as longer, 

 cleaner stems would be by retention, and as their large and widely 

 branching crowns interfere much more than is desirable with the 

 growth of the underwood, it has been arranged that the fall should 

 first of all, before introducing this twenty years' rotation, pass over 

 the whole of the areas under copse during the next ten years 

 (1899-1900 to 1908-1909), and that at the end of this time the 

 fall of one-twentieth of the area each year will then be adopted 

 (1909-1910 to 1928-1929). While this course is prescribed mainly 

 with a view to effecting, as speedily as seems feasible, improve- 

 ments in the condition both of the standard trees and of the 

 coppice, it is also at the same time intended to bring in revenue 

 till the time when thinnings from the coniferous plantations may 

 be expected to become remunerative and to contribute annually 

 to the income from the woodland portions of the estate. 



For the coniferous plantations growing into high forest, it would 

 be premature to prescribe the period of rotation in the meantime. 

 All that can at present be said is that, except for unforeseen acci- 

 dents, they will (with the exception of II. c and II. D, which should 

 be cleared and utilised at once) probably reach their financial 

 maturity about the age of sixty or seventy years. At the age of 

 about forty to forty-five years, or thirty to forty years if the 

 younger plantations are allowed to grow up in fair canopy, pro- 

 vision will usually have to be made for underwood to protect the 

 soil, a partial clearance of the crop being made for this purpose, 

 after the young trees have culminated in their rate of growth in 

 height. In portions of some of the older plantations (e.g., parts 

 stocked with thirty-year-old larch in Wolmer Plantation, IV. f) this 

 is already requisite, even without any further clearance of stems 

 in addition to those already removed, except such as arc badly 

 cankered. Hence, in the case of the coniferous plantations, merely 

 a scheme of thinnings is proposed for the next ten years. 



