NOTES ON CONTINENTAL FORESTRY IN 1906. 79 
Wein (Munich) is of opinion that as artificial manuring pays in 
agriculture, it should be even more profitable in forestry. The 
requirements as to plant-food for woodland trees is not small, 
as, for example, in the case of 1- and 2-year old Scots pine, 
which extract from the soil about 60 lbs. of nitrogen, 40 of 
potash, 25 of phosphoric acid, and 50 of lime per acre. Hence, 
he considers, the gradual but certain exhaustion of woodland 
soil should be counteracted by suitable manuring. Woodland 
soil, he says, is deficient especially in a regular source of nitrogen, 
such as is supplied to farm-land by stable-manure and the 
accompanying activity of soil-bacteria, with the result that good 
farm-land contains up to o'15 per cent. or more of nitrogen, 
as compared with only oor to o’03 per cent. in woodlands. 
And the same is the case, he states, as to phosphoric acid, 
although there is generally sufficient potash, except in very light 
soil and moorland. He shares the opinion held by some (see 
our Zvansactions, Vol. XIX. Part II., 1906, page 249) that quickly- 
grown plants, raised in rich nurseries, are better able to thrive 
when transplanted to poor woodland soil than plants of less rapid 
development ; but exact investigations will in due course of time 
prove whether there may not be here, as in so many other 
things, a golden mean. Certainly, if animal life may be allowed 
to furnish any fair and reasonable analogy, a human being of 
any age—child, youth, or adult—is better able to satisfy any 
demands made on him or her if merely well nourished, and 
neither too richly fed nor in any way starved. The opinion may 
be wrong, but if I were purchasing plants I should personally 
prefer well-developed, well-rooted, compact, healthy-looking, 
sturdy, bushy plants, grown on a good soil somewhat above 
the medium. Put such in a better soil than that of their nursery, 
and they will very soon overcome the disturbance caused by 
transplanting ; and if they are unfortunately to be put out on 
jand much poorer than the nursery, there is, one would think, 
more chance of the plant soon accommodating itself to the 
changed environment, and the more or less damaged condition 
of its root-system, than if it had been accustomed to consider- 
ably larger food-supplies in the nursery. This touches, how- 
ever, on a physiological question that has perhaps not yet been 
fully studied—namely, Can any plant imbibe more food than is 
sufficient for its natural requirements, or than can be assimilated 
in a thorough manner, or stored up with advantage to the indi- 
