ARBORICULTURE IN HAMPSHIRE. 35 



In order to avoid this expense and waste of time, ash and Spanish 

 chestnut were substituted, and found to answer as well as larch. 

 Both are excellent coppice woods, and send up numerous strong 

 shoots the first season after the crop is cut. They grow rapidly, 

 and when treated as underwood, produce a crop of clean, straight 

 poles, which command a good price and ready sale amongst hop- 

 growers. Various ways of forming coppices of hop-poles are 

 adopted in the south, but many of them I cannot recommend. 

 The alternate system of planting ash and Spanish chestnut is objec- 

 tionable ; and when these sorts are mixed indiscriminately with 

 larch, the succeeding shoots of the coppice stools are irregularly 

 distributed over the ground. This necessitates a large amount of 

 filling up (especially where larch predominates), after the first fall 

 of poles. Another system I condemn is that of planting ash and 

 Spanish chestnut in masses, at distances of only 2^ feet. This 

 distance apart is perfectly legitimate for the first crop ; but when 

 that is cut, and each stool sends forth a number of shoots, the 

 coppice becomes overcrowded. The following system is now 

 adopted on many estates in Hants : — Ash or Spanish chestnut is 

 planted at regular distances apart, and in sections, according to 

 the nature of the soil. The whole ground is afterwards filled up 

 with larch 2 or 2| feet from plant to plant. If the soil and 

 situation are best adapted for ash, the forester will plant these 

 first in rows at a distance suitable for the particular size of poles 

 required. He will afterwards alternate the ash with larch in the 

 rows, and plant an intermediate row of larch between the rows of 

 ash, at half the distance of those previously planted. If the ash 

 is planted at 5 feet apart, and the same distance between the 

 rows, 1440 plants will stand on an acre; and when the whole is 

 finished as above described, there will be 5530 larches on every 

 acre planted. This is a material increase of poles when the first 

 crop is cleared ; and as the larches do not shoot again, the per- 

 manent stools are at proper distances for coppice. 



Before leaving this subject, I ought to state that various sorts 

 of plantation produce are sold for hop-poles without being grown 

 specially for that purpose. The first thinnings of larch, the nurses 

 from oak or mixed hardwood plantations, and straight poles of 

 every description, command good prices in hop districts. Small 

 thinnings of Scotch and spruce firs are sometimes sold, but these 

 never bring large prices. 



Osiers, or basket willows, are cultivated extensively in South 



