l6o TRANSACTIONS OF ROYAL SCOTTISH ARBORICULTURAL SOCIETY. 



lo inches, and a height of 15 to 20 feet. The Douglas 

 fir, from which great things were expected, has proved a 

 complete failure, growing up thin and weakly, even when in 

 a well-sheltered place and on good soil. 



No Sitka spruce or Japanese larch was tried in the locality 

 till 1904. In that year some waste ground near the first wood 

 at an old colliery south of Bridgeness, a little over 100 feet 

 above sea-level, and half a mile inland from the Firth of Forth, 

 was planted with beech, birch, sycamore, Japanese larch, 

 spruce, Austrian pine, and some specimens of Sitka, nobilis, 

 and Douglas spruce. 



After six years the growth of these different trees can be 

 noted. The Japanese larches are 11 to 12 feet high, with an 

 average growth during the last four years of 2 feet. The Austrian 

 pines are 5^ feet high at most, with an average growth of not 

 more than i foot, and the beeches are the same height as the 

 pines. The Norway spruce is only 4 feet high, and the nobilis 

 not more than 2 ft. 6 ins. The Sitka firs, of which there 

 are only a few specimens, are from 7^ to gi feet high, with 

 strong robust stems, with an annual growth increasing every 

 year, and reaching from 24 to 30 inches for the summer of 

 1909. The best of the Japanese larches added from 27 to 

 32 inches to their height, and thus it appears that among the 

 conifers, the Japanese larch and the Sitka spruce have grown 

 about equally fast, and have far outstripped all the other 

 species. As for the Douglas firs, the best are not more than 

 a couple of feet high, and many can hardly be seen among 

 the grass. 



In the spring of 1904 I sowed plots of Oregon Douglas, and 

 Sitka spruce, as well as Robinia pseudacacia} larch, and other 

 trees recommended as suitable for afforestation in this country. 

 The Douglas came up well, but after six years the majority have 

 been killed by the frost, and the tree appears to be too delicate 

 for this locality. The plants were sown in good free ground 

 near sea-level, and in 1906 the survivors, after one transplanting, 

 were transplanted again, this time to a new nursery on the 

 south slope of Bonnytoun Hill at the new Grange Mansion 

 House, at a height of 440 feet, where the soil is good loam 

 on a subsoil of clay and decomposed basalt. There are strong 

 S.W. winds on this site, but the nursery is partially sheltered 

 1 Called "Lncust" in America. — Hon. Ed. 



