170 TRANSACTIONS OF ROYAL SCOTTISH ARBORICULTURAL SOCIETY. 



deterioration, and their productive capacity will be lowered. We 

 must also replace our timber stocks, and increase them by the 

 planting of new ground to as great an extent as possible. We 

 are faced with the problem of developing forestry as an important 

 national industry on a scientific and economic basis, and in view 

 of the serious extent to which our timber resources will be 

 depleted at the end of the war, we can afford to lose no time in 

 getting to work. Nevertheless, for the sake of the future, what 

 better beginning can be made at the present time, than to train 

 and interest as large a number of the rising generation in forestry 

 as possible? 



Our lack of appreciation of what forestry means to our 

 country, in the past, has led to its neglect. Let us, therefore, hope 

 that an extended knowledge of what forestry really is, and what 

 it means to any country, will lend support to the development of 

 an industry so vital and essential, and that by making every 

 effort to interest young people in forestry we may ensure that the 

 rising generation will have a clearer perception of the almost 

 unlimited scope and advantage of a sound policy of forest 

 conservation. Hon. Ed. 



Timber Transport. 

 i^With Plate.) 



In the autumn of 1916, about 500 Scots pine trees of an 

 average size of 26 cubic feet were sold standing, by the writer, in 

 a long narrow plantation extending to a length of nearly 

 two miles. 



Unfortunately, owing to the conformation of the ground, it was 

 only possible to remove the timber by taking it all to one end of 

 the plantation in order to get it loaded near a hard road, and, as 

 it had to be transported over a soft bottom, and across some 

 long, deep gullies, it was not practicable to remove it by horse 

 haulage. It was, therefore, decided to lay a tramway line nearly 

 the whole length of the wood, and this was done by securing a 

 quantity of the light rails usually employed in coal pits, i.e. rails 

 12 feet long, weighing 18 lbs. per running yard. These were 

 fixed to light fir sleepers, 3 ft. x 5 ins. x 2 ins., and carted to the 

 ground, where they were placed in position by a couple of 



