232 TRANSACTIONS OF ROYAL SCOTTISH ARBORICULTURAL SOCIETY. 



XXVI. John, Duke of Atholl, his Larch Plantations {11 1i-\^2)0), 

 and the Larch Disease. By John Booth, Gross-Lichterfelde, 

 near Berlin. 



In the Transactions of the Royal Scottish Arboricultural Society 

 for 1901 (Part 3 of Yolume XYI.), I find on page 515 that on the 

 7th of August, under the presidency of Mr Munro Ferguson, the 

 Excursion dinner was followed by a lively discussion on some 

 questions of great interest to arboriculturists. Among these 

 questions the Larch disease occupied a prominent position. I 

 cannot say that I agree with all that has been said on this subject, 

 but I have waited till the Transactions of 1902 were published, 

 hoping that somebody would take the matter up. I was rather 

 disappointed, and so I think it my duty to write these lines. 



Having been a member of this Society since 1876, I have 

 derived from it in all these years so much valuable information 

 regarding the growth and the progress of newly-introduced 

 foreign timber trees, and in my several visits to Scotland have 

 had such kind assistance from men like John M'Gregor, Wm. 

 M'Corquodale, Malcolm Dunn — all dead now, — that I embrace 

 with pleasure this opportunity of returning my thanks to the 

 Society, by directing attention to a publication which seems to be 

 quite forgotten. 



The general laws of naturalisation, i.e., bringing a plant from 

 its native country into another, are almost the same all over the 

 vegetable kingdom. In introducing the Douglas Fir from North 

 America or the Larch from the Alps, we need the same care not 

 to place them in situations or plant them in soils which are 

 opposed to their nature. Certainly there might be more difficulty 

 about the one than the other. The Douglas Fir, which is dis- 

 tributed over an area of more than 50,000 square miles, is not 

 confined to mountainous regions, and grows very freely in many 

 soils and situations. The Douglas Fir will therefore undergo this 

 change much easier than the Larch, which, being an alpine tree, 

 can only be grown in high regions, and only in such localities can 

 offer successful resistance to the attacks of disease. So I have 

 felt for many years the most lively interest in collecting all avail- 

 able information on the Larch, with regard to the introduction 

 of foreign timber trees. When I look over the papers which 

 have been published during the last quarter of the nineteenth 



