GROWTH OF THE SITKA SPRUCE AND OTHER TREES. 167 



As for the Douglas fir, my twenty years' experience of the tree 

 is that whether reared from seed at home, or bought from good 

 nurserymen abroad, whether grown in sheltered or exposed 

 places, in good soil or bad, wet or dry, high up or low down, 

 it is so delicate as to be worthless for practical afforestation in 

 this part of Scotland, although it may and does thrive well in 

 other and milder districts. Possibly the small amount of smoke 

 in the air may have something to do with the explanation. If 

 so, this is another point in favour of the Sitka spruce, which does 

 not seem to mind the presence of a little smoke. 



The difficulty in the way of planting Sitka forests arises at 

 present from the high price nurserymen charge in this country 

 for the young trees. The price in some foreign nurseries is 

 considerably lower, and it is high time that practical men at 

 home turned their attention to the propagation in large 

 quantities of this admirable and very handsome conifer, instead 

 of allowing the enterprising foreigner to get ahead of us, and do 

 the elementary work we should be doing ourselves. The seed 

 is not always easily obtainable, but one advantage of the Sitka 

 is said to be the facility with which it can be propagated from 

 cuttings. This fact only recently came to my notice, but the 

 cuttings I have lately put in to test the matter will not show any 

 results for some months. I may be able, perhaps, to report 

 progress in some future communication. 



In conclusion, I entirely agree with Mr Crozier's words in his 

 excellent and most useful paper, on page i r of this (twenty- 

 third) volume of the Society's Transactions : "As a tree for hill 

 planting Sitka spruce has proved its superiority over larch, 

 Scots pine, and Norway spruce in a marked degree, its power 

 of resistance against winds, and its general reliability on exposed 

 sites far surpassing any of those species." I might add that 

 its virtues are apparently not necessarily confined to its 

 behaviour on hilly sites. It is a noble and ornamental tree for 

 a park, and will probably produce, in sheltered places with a 

 moist clay soil, more wood than most other conifers, while for 

 shelter belts and where cover is wanted, it may prove in certain 

 districts to be the most valuable member of the whole fir tribe. 



