GROWTH OF THE SITKA SPRUCE AND OTHER TREES. I 63 



of Craigdouffie. This land has once been cultivated, and the 

 soil is a little better than in plantation C, which is half a mile 

 further west on the same hillside. After fencing it and cutting 

 numerous ditches and .<;heep drains, the whole area was planted 

 with 15,000 trees, the principal species being Norway spruce 

 (4000), Scots fir (4000), European larch (3000,) Japanese larch 

 (1000), Sitka spruce (800), Douglas (green) (500), Weymouth 

 (500), birch (500), and some alder, oak, ash, rowan, maple, and 

 poplar. Most of these trees were bought from home nursery- 

 men. At the end of six years the result is not encouraging. 

 Three-quarters of the trees are dead or sickly, and of those 

 which have survived, the birches and alders are by far the 

 most vigorous. Next come the Scots firs and Japanese larches, 

 which appear much more hardy than their European relatives. 

 The trees were planted 3^ feet apart, in alternate lines of Scots 

 fir and spruce, or larch and spruce, with the other kinds 

 scattered at irregular intervals over the ground. The lines of 

 spruce and larch can hardly be seen, but the isolated specimens 

 of Sitka are strong and vigorous. The Japanese larches, 

 wherever there was any shelter, are growing, though not so well 

 as to encourage much more planting, but the Douglas has 

 disappeared entirely from the scene. 



The inference is that a mixture of Sitka spruce and Scots 

 pine, with some birch and alder for nurses, would be the best 

 to plant on a wet and windy place such as this. Norway 

 spruce can nowhere compare with Sitka in situations and on 

 soil such as this, and European is inferior to Japanese larch, 

 which is not to be recommended in such moist and exposed 

 situations. 



The locality was once rich in coal and ironstone, the Banton 

 Blackband seam having been for generations a valuable source 

 of the iron made in the Carron Works after the estate came 

 into the possession of the writer's family in rySy. The huge 

 black blaes bings at the mouths of the abandoned pits form 

 conspicuous landmarks, and cover a good many acres of waste 

 land. Several of them have, however, been removed for brick- 

 making purposes within the last twenty years, and both the 

 bings, and the sites of tho«e that have been removed, are 

 tempting places for aboricultural experiments. 



Before speaking of planting trees on such ground, a few 

 general remarks by an old geologist as to the rubbish heaps, or 



