8 TRANSACTIONS OF ROYAL SCOTTISH ARBORICULTURAL SOCIETY. 



At present in our part of the world experience seems to show 

 that generally speaking planting as far as 7 feet apart brings 

 out the best result. With that we have to take into considera- 

 tion snow and various other matters. The planting distance of 

 the old plantations was 6 feet. It was later reduced to 3^", feet, 

 but this was not a success, and we are now back to 6 or 

 7 feet, and the reason for the longer distance is the shortage 

 of plants combined with an endeavour to re-establish the woods 

 without loss of time. So far as pit-props are concerned, the 

 railway freights place the home-grown product at a dis- 

 advantage. We are trying to do away with unnecessary 

 thinning. 



" Among the rapid-growing conifers is the hybrid-larch. The 

 only trouble that we have with this tree is that if you plant it 

 with Douglas fir the latter gets smothered. We are planting 

 Douglas 6 feet apart, because it grows so fast that it deals with 

 its own pruning. There are trees of hybrid larch 15 or 16 years 

 old, I should think, between 40 or 60 feet now. We have now 

 got to the second generation of them, and it will be worth making 

 a separate report on them when we are in a position to do so. 

 The Sitka spruce we are planting at 3^ feet and the Norway 

 spruce at 3I feet, because at this distance they clean themselves. 

 Those are the distances at which we are also planting the 

 Scots pine, but we have to thin it. Our real difficulty with the 

 Scots pine is snow damage, if we plant it too far apart, and 

 even if we plant it too close the same difficulty arises when we 

 begin to thin, but there is no doubt that Scots pine must be 

 thinned early, otherwise the whole plantation gets smashed up 

 with snow." 



Mr Charles Buchanan moved a hearty vote of thanks to the 

 Chairman. 



