158 TRANSACTIONS OK ROVAL SCOTTISH ARBOKICULTURAL SOCIETY. 



larger or smaller scheme. From the purely silvicultural 

 standpoint this is no doubt true, but .unfortunately in 

 dealing with particular areas there are other factors which 

 require consideration. 



It is probably a reasonable statement to make that a large 

 proportion of '' the subjects " available for afforestation (deer 

 forests, sheep runs, grouse grounds, common grazing, and 

 crofter " summing ") are composed partly of low ground 

 which can be planted, and partly of high, wet, or unsuitable 

 land, on which experience has shown silviculture on a 

 commercial basis to be impossible. It will also be allowed 

 that the planting of any subject will interfere not only with 

 the exact area which is taken for tree growing, but also with 

 the residue of the unsuitable land thrown out of gear by the 

 reduction of what is technically known as " wintering." 



It is therefore a fair deduction to make — except where the 

 land severed can otherwise be profitably employed — that in 

 any area the proportion of plantable low land to unplantable 

 " hinterland " will be the determining factor whether that area 

 can be planted with economic success or with economic loss. 



Let me put this in a concrete form. A sheep farm of 5000 

 acres with 500 acres of plantable valley ground might maintain 

 some 2000 sheep including 800 breeding ewes. If the 500 

 acres of wintering were curtailed by a planting scheme 

 involving the acquisition of say 100 acres of low-lying land 

 per annum, the reduction would be one-fifth, not one-fiftieth, 

 of the value of the farm. It might therefore be argued that, 

 by the end of the second year of planting, when the ground 

 capable of wintering the ewe stock had been very considerably 

 reduced, the farmer would ask for and would receive 

 compensation based on the valuation of the whole of the 

 sheep stock and not on the two-fiftieths of the same, as the 

 Erosion Report would lead one to suppose. 



It does not require a profound knowledge of sheep 

 valuations to realise that in a case of this sort the sum allowed 

 (6s. per acre) would represent a very small fraction of the 

 compensation that might have to be paid for every acre of 

 land planted. 



Take again the case of the typical deer forest of 10,000 

 acres with 2000 acres of wintering. It is conceivable, by 

 careful management and by planting over an extended period 



