56 TRANSACTIONS OF ROYAL SCOTTISH ARBORICULTURAL SOCIETY. 



to be found in the lower valleys and on the best soils ; but many 

 of the slopes in these valleys, which are too steep for field crops, 

 give satisfactory results with ash, beech, sycamore and oak. 

 On the soils usually available for the growth of timber the 

 district generally is, however, one for conifers. 



The forest garden plots were laid out by Dr Somerville of 

 Oxford, about twelve years ago, and they now form a very 

 valuable adjunct to the class-room for instruction in silviculture. 

 The garden contains about twenty miniature forests, varying in 

 size from half an acre to one acre. 



The plots represent pure and mixed woods of various "light" 

 and "shade" trees. Here the student can at once have a 

 bird's-eye view, so to speak, of the earlier stages of many 

 different kinds of forest, and of many of the results of various 

 combinations and mixtures of species. It is hardly an exaggera- 

 tion to say that without some such means of illustrating certain 

 silvicultural principles, it is impossible to convey any proper 

 conception of them to the mind of a student who has had no 

 previous acquaintance with woods. These plots will now be 

 supplemented by new and duplicate ones in the other Demonstra- 

 tion woods in Co. Durham, which are more accessible to the 

 teaching centre. 



While, individually, the Cockle Park plots are miniature 

 forests, collectively they constitute a piece of woodland of 

 considerable size. Situated as they are, also, close to woods 

 of considerable extent, they will now provide material of very 

 considerable value for the purposes of growth studies. Space 

 does not permit of any of these questions being dealt with here. 



Chopwell Woods. 



The woodland area at Chopwell, although not of sufficient 

 extent to fulfil all the requirements of a school for practical 

 training, can be used for most of the purposes to which a 

 Demonstration forest can be put. The woods are worked as a 

 commercial undertaking, but all the actual forestry operations 

 are carried out by student workers under the guidance of a 

 skilled foreman. The smallness of the area necessarily limits 

 the number of such students. A working - scheme has been 

 drawn up, and has been in operation for five years. The working 

 students are young men qualifying to act as head foresters on 



