MANAGEMENT OF FIEE PROTECTION LINES. 205 



line, a second line behind the first must be prepared and main- 

 tained in the same way, until the latter becomes more effective. 

 As old timber forms a more imperfect protection against sparks 

 than a young crop, and as the former is more likely to prove 

 dangerous to telegraph lines or endanger the permanent way 

 itself if overturned by wind, the trees on the protection line 

 should be worked on a, short rotation. When the crop is felled, 

 however, a temporary strip behind must be provided with cross 

 tracks until the ground in front is again stocked with trees of 

 the required height. After the felling, the ground should be re- 

 planted with ball-plants at 4 feet apart, and the ground between 

 should be broken up for several years. After the trees have 

 reached a height equal to that of the engine funnels, they may be 

 considered an effectual protection, and the further breaking up of 

 the ground may cease : in order to hasten this stage, the effect of 

 artificial manures on the young trees may be tried on poor ground. 

 By carefully carrying out the above rules, the maintenance of 

 bare and unprofitable strips of ground becomes unnecessary, and 

 it may also be possible to utilise the bared tracks as footpaths 

 or roads. When the traffic is insufficient to keep down surface 

 growth, a grubber or horse-hoe must be run over them occasion- 

 ally for this purpose ; the cost of doing this need not be more 

 than 16s, to 20s. for a length of 2| miles or so, and in thinly 

 inhabited districts, with long lines of railway, it is an invaluable 

 method of safeguarding the adjoining forest. 



In a note appended to the reprint of the above article, 

 Dr Kienitz calls attention to the suitability of these protection 

 lines for the growing of telegraph poles for the Post Office. 

 These poles must be clean, straight, and with little taper*, and are 

 usually obtained in Germany by taking out dominant trees in 

 middle-aged forest, which ought properly to stand until the 

 end of the rotation. Dr Kienitz thinks it might be arranged 

 to grow a large proportion of such poles on these fire lines, and 

 thus to supply the requirements of the postal authorities, and 

 protect the forests from fire in one and the same operation, as the 

 low rotation natui'ally lends itself to the task. 



Possibly many of our large Scots fir plantations in Great 

 Britain through which railway lines run, and which often suffer 

 from fire in dry summers, might be protected in the same or 

 in a modified form of the same manner as the German forests. 



