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REARING AND MANAGEMENT OF HARDWOOD PLANTATIONS. 377 
rhododendron are also brought into requisition under the head 
we have just been considering. Picked plants—large, shapely, 
and well-developed plants—should be kept for this purpose, and 
the best of them put next the walks, or the parts where they are 
most likely to be in view. It is acommon thing to grow good 
poplars, planted at from 5 to 6 feet apart, in partially sheltered 
situations without nurses. 
Pruning.—This is a most important branch of forestry, but one 
which is, unfortunately, very often neglected. The main point 
in this case is to begin in time. Ifa plantation be allowed to 
attain a certain age before pruning is commenced, it certainly 
does more harm than good. Wholesale pruning of a tree twenty 
or twenty-five years of age, for instance, is very apt to badly 
injure it; hence the reason why so many experienced men are 
averse to pruning. If it be intended to do justice to a plantation 
in this respect, we must begin with the pocket-knife and hand- 
saw two or three years after planting, and continue using them 
at regular intervals up to, say, the twenty-fifth year. 
In commencing pruning operations, the main object to be kept 
in view is to regulate the growth of the tree by keeping the 
number of superfluous branches in check, and the undue develop- 
ment of others, so that the greatest quantity of timber may be 
secured without being intruded upon by the production of strong 
branches. Pruning, when resorted to in time and continued at 
necessary intervals, is an operation which does not cost so very 
much, and which is, at the same time, beneficial in a high degree 
to the trees. If, on the other hand, this highly-important operation 
be neglected, a great number of the trees will have grown into 
bushes, which in turn will become distorted into every shape 
imaginable. If pruning be resorted to at all in such cases, it 
must be executed ina very judicious manner. To, as it were, 
force such trees into a symmetrical appearance, by stripping the 
trunk of branches to a certain height, and by shortening those left 
indiscriminately, the result would be that the tree would die ina 
short time, or never, at least, recover from the sudden shock. 
When such an operation is performed in winter, if the tree should 
survive, the consequence will be that the sudden check on the 
flow of sap will cause numerous small-spray, known under the 
name of “ breast-wood,” to spring out all over the stem and 
branches. The woody deposit, which would otherwise have gone 
to enlarge the stem, would thus be reduced toa minimum. In 
