BELGIAN FORESTRY IN SOME OF ITS ASPECTS. I4I 
conditions are practically the same as those of the lower zone. 
In the higher zone, the altitude of which is from 1590 to 2160 
feet—it is, in fact, the highest part of Belgium—we were shown 
some very interesting work. In many parts the crop consists of 
pure spruce, but in other parts it consists of birch coppice-with- 
standards. On arriving at what appeared to be the summit we 
left our conveyances and made a short tour on foot. On our 
right we had, considering the altitude, a very fine crop of pure 
spruce, and on our left bare ground of a very poor quality. 
The flora is sub-alpine, Salix repens, Betula pubescens, and a 
species of large-stemmed bilberry being conspicuous. The 
country looked a typical waste—what seemed an ideal field for 
the enthusiastic advocate of the planting of waste land to try his 
hand upon. But under similar conditions our method of deal- 
ing with a subject such as this would, as a rule, be somewhat 
different from what we saw here. In most cases we would plant 
without any preparation in the way of shelter, with the result 
that, as a rule, the venture would end in failure. Not so, 
however, with the Belgian forester. He tries first of all to form 
a barrier to the prevailing winds, and thus prepare his land for 
his crop of trees. Here the planting had been commenced at 
the bottom of the hill, so that its sheltering influence had been 
gradually extended upwards. At the highest part was a large, 
damp, mossy waste, covered with grass of a very inferior type, 
notably Wardus stricta, and this was now being dealt with in the 
following manner:—At intervals varying from 13 to 33 feet 
apart, ‘a swathe is mown with the scythe, and along this a trench 
or drain is then cut by two men who follow the scythe-man. 
After lining out the drain, one man cuts the turfs and the other 
pulls them out, and in doing so he pulls two turfs to one side 
and two to the other. In the act of pulling, the turfs are turned 
upside down, and laid close together, and in this position they 
are allowed to lie for two years. At the end of this period 
planting is commenced, and is done in the following manner :— 
A man with a special auger-shaped spade or planting-iron cuts 
a hole clean out of the turf after the manner of cheese-testing. 
A woman who follows places in each hole so formed a spruce 
plant otf a size about equal to our 2-year—2-year transplants, 
and as each plant is inserted a double handful of imported 
soil, to which a small quantity of basic slag has been added, is 
placed round its roots, and the remainder of the hole filled up 
