78 TRANSACTIONS OF ROYAL SCOTTISH ARBORICULTURAL SOCIETY. 



1 8 inches in the year), and partly to certain rights possessed by the 

 public. The most injurious of these is the right to take up and 

 remove the fallen pine needles for litter, thus depriving the trees 

 of their natural manure. The result is that these woods produce 

 only 250 cubic metres of timber to the hectare, instead of 500 

 cubic metres as woods on better soil do. But if the forest at 

 Nuremberg is not remarkable for productiveness, it is a good 

 example of what may be achieved under the most adverse 

 circumstances, and it made us feel that there is no soil in our 

 country in which we need despair of making trees grow. 



About 15 years ago, a large part of the area we visited was 

 devastated by a plague of caterpillars, to the extent of 2500 acres, 

 and re-afforestation has been going on ever since. We therefore 

 saw mostly young Scots pine plantations at various stages of 

 growth. But we also saw some which had reached 80 years, and 

 were therefore considered mature and ripe for cutting. As just 

 stated, these were poor trees for their age ; but in spite of 

 drawbacks, they will make good trees, if only allowed time 

 enough. A certain number are allowed to remain for a second 

 rotation of 80 years, and some even for a third. Of the last 

 class, we noticed a very good specimen with a tall straight stem 

 and a girth of 8 feet 9 inches. 



In the evening we came on to Aschaflfenburg to be ready for 

 our final excursion. 



Aug. 10. The concluding day of our Bavarian forest insj)ec- 

 tion was also the longest. We left Aschaffenburg at six in the 

 morning in a procession of fifteen carriages, and did not get back 

 again till half-past eight at night. During the interval we were 

 able to see a great extent of the Spessart, one of the most famous 

 forests of Germany. The trees are chiefly of the broad-leaved and 

 deciduous kinds, more than 50 per cent, consisting of beech and 

 15 per cent, of oak. The beech is now used almost entirely for 

 underplanting the oak. Though it fetches a fair price for fuel, 

 for furniture, and for railway sleepers, it is chiefly valued and 

 grown as a fertiliser of the soil. Without the humus formed 

 by the decaying leaves of the beech, the oak would never grow 

 in the poor sandy soil of the district. As it is, the oaks of the 

 Spessart are the finest in Germany, and probably in Europe. 

 The only species grown here is the Sessile oak {Quercus 

 sessiliflord), which the Germans consider to be much the best 

 variety for three reasons : — the grain of the wood is closer than 



