8 TRANSACTIONS OF ROYAL SCOTTISH ARBORICULTURAL SOCIETY. 
2. Development of a Larch Crop. 
(With Plate.) 
By A. Murray, Forester, Murthly, Perthshire. 
A great deal has been written about the formation and 
rearing of plantations, but it is only occasionally that one 
learns anything about the value of, or the income derived from, 
middle-aged and mature woods. 
To state in detail how woods should be managed so as to 
become a source of profit to their owners is not the object of 
this paper; but I feel confident that land under properly 
managed woods will yield a higher return per acre than it will 
under grazing, or even in many cases under agricultural crops, 
involving, as they do, the upkeep of expensive buildings, 
fences, drains and other contingencies. 
The following measurements of six larch trees growing in a 
plantation on the Murthly estate show the annual increment 
of wood produced by them during the last fourteen years, and 
they furnish an illustration of the profit which may be expected 
from a middle-aged wood of this sort. The crop is of pure 
larch, about forty-two years of age, and the trees stand about 
11 feet apart on the average. ‘The plantation was first thinned, 
at the age of 27 years, during the spring of 1891, at which time 
I marked and carefully measured these six trees. At that time I 
formed the opinion that the first thinning (for a crop of larch) 
had been too long delayed, as the trees seemed to be too tall 
and slender for the position they occupied, while the amount of 
living foliage was also too small for a light-demanding tree of 
this sort. The soil is thin and gravelly, and rests on slate-rock, 
at an elevation of from 600 to goo feet above sea-level. The 
exposure is south-easterly, and the plantation is somewhat 
sheltered from the north-east. The prevailing winds are from 
the north and west. The adjoining land is let for hill-grazing, 
at a rent of about one shilling per acre. 
The measurements and increments of the trees referred to 
were as follows :— 
