DEPARTMENTAL REPORT ON DEER FORESTS. lOI 



creation, maintenance, and utilisation of timber crops 

 would surpass by many times that required for the 

 service of sheep farms or deer forests." 

 3. "As an agency for increasing the productiveness of the 

 deer forest area, and providing steady employment for 

 a larger population, we consider silviculture is of the 

 first importance, especially in view of the adoption by 

 Parliament of a definite planting policy." 

 The conclusions are decisive, and if British land of the 

 type of the average deer forest is to be utilised to the best 

 advantage from the point of view of national prosperity, it 

 should be afforested. The forest in formation will engage 

 400 per cent, more labour than either deer forest or sheep 

 grazing, and after complete establishment it will increase this 

 employment by 500 per cent., so that where ;^ioo is expended 

 in labour under deer or sheep, from ;^4oo to ^900 ultimately 

 will be forthcoming when aflforestation is prosecuted. This is 

 purely the labour side, but if the Highlands are to be repeopled, 

 or if the existing population is to be maintained, work must 

 be found if comfort and contentment are to be attained. In 

 production the forest is far ahead of any other known use 

 of hill land, and the product has to be worked by human 

 energy. There are 189 deer forests in Scotland, and a large 

 number of them are in the market. The Forestry Commission 

 have already acquired and are planting three deer forests, and 

 reference to them is made in the Report. There can surely be 

 no better sphere for the Commission than planting up such 

 places, but the Commission must have the support of the 

 people of Scotland, if the programme authorised by the Govern- 

 ment in 1919, already seriously curtailed almost at its birth, 

 is to be carried out. 



Efforts are being made in other directions to introduce 

 industries into Scotland, qnd north of the Forth there now is 

 some prospect of the utilisation of water powers which, like 

 the mountain land, have been allowed to run to waste, and it 

 would be proper that afforestation should proceed side by side 

 with enterprises involving the harnessing of water. It is a well- 

 established fact in hydrodynamics that the forest regulates 

 and conserves the supply of water, and the main water powers 

 of Scotland usually are found among the mountains and glens, 

 which are good virgin ground for coniferous woods. By 



