328 



TRANSACTIONS AND PROCEEDINGS OF 



[Sess. 



Retardation of Girth-increase in Mid-Season in certain Conifene. 



I have shown that a retardation of growth took place in 

 the genus Qmrcus, and possibly in Cratccgus Oxyacantha, 

 among the Deciduous trees, but the same tendency is more 

 distinct in certain of the Coniferai, as the following Table 

 shows. 



The results in Thuja and P. excelsa may be accidental, the 

 former being a single tree of its species, and the latter 

 because its two companions do not show the same tendency ; 

 but that retardation is characteristic of some species of Abies 

 can hardly be doubted as it occurred in five of the six trees 

 of the three quick-growing reliable species. In a paper in 

 the Transactions and Proceedings of our Society, 1891, p. lOG, 

 giving the results of weekly measurements, 1 have entered 

 more fully into this question, and have shown that in Nos. 

 8 and 91, the quickest growers and most reliable of all, the 

 retardation was most marked, and that 91 actually took a 

 complete rest of a fortnight, early in summer, two years in 

 succession. 



e. Proportion of Girth-increase in the First and Second Half- 

 Seasons in the Conifer.T. 



Here, as in tlie JJeeidnous class, a tendency to law is 

 seen by merely inspecting the position of the trees in Table 

 XII., where they are arranged in tlie order of greatest growth 

 in the first half- season. 



In a list of thirty-four trees, tliirteen of the old and 

 twenty-one of tlie new set, the four e.xam])les of Arauraria 

 are found within eleven places of the to]) ; tbe three of 

 C. JJcoilara within iive of the bottom, their near relative 



