CHAP. cm. SALICA^CE^. 5'A^LIX. 1469 



to imbibe the oozing water. They ought, therefore, either to be open drains, 

 or drains built on the sides, and covered over with flags, to prevent their 

 being cholced up with the roots. A variety of cases may, however, occur, 

 where it will be impossible to form covered drains ; or where, perhaps, tlie 

 expense might operate as a prohibition to doing so with the view of planting 

 willows. In such cases, the ground may be formed into beds of a less or 

 greater size, according to circumstances, by open cuts, or drains, of a sufficient 

 width and tlepth to keep the soil dry. These open drains will require to be 

 cleaned out every autumn and spring ; and the cleanings may be scattered 

 over the general surface of the beds. In preparing ground for an osier plan- 

 tation, if the soil be poor, it should be as well dressed with dung as if it were 

 intended for a crop of wheat or barley. The manure most proper for willows 

 is stable dung." {Plant. Kal., p. 520.) Sang " tried lime as a manure for 

 willows, but found the twigs much fired, or spotted, with a sort of canker ; and, 

 in attempting to bend them, they readily broke over at the cankered place. 

 Indeed, if a plantation of osiers be formed previously to a thorough preparation 

 of the soil for the reception of the plants, the saving of the first expense will be 

 found a most severe loss in the end, by the diminution of the crop in the suc- 

 ceeding seasons. In no case should a plantation of willows be attempted, 

 but in prepared ground ; except, perhaps, where a few rows may be intro- 

 duced upon the very brink of a river, or on the top of the banks of ditches, 

 which form, in many instances, the barrier of the waters, where the soil can 

 scarcely be dug or otherwise ameliorated. Nothing can be farther from being 

 good management than planting the truncheons in grass land, and allowing 

 the sward to remain green under, or among the crop. Having fixed upon 

 the spot, and having also carefully prepared the ground, the next step is to 

 procure plants. These should be of the last year's wood, or of shoots of one 

 year old, taken from the under end of well-ripened shoots of good size, 

 and cut in a slanting du-ection, with a sharp knife ; and they should be in 

 lengths of I ft. or \ ft. 4 in. Every vigorous shoot will afford two or three 

 plants. Tiie upper end, as far as it appears soft, being unripe, should be dis- 

 carded ; because such wood will only produce weak plants, and will not 

 make such good roots the first season, as the firmer parts of the shoots will 

 do. Pieces of two-ycars-old shoots of the same length, and cut in the same 

 manner, may also be usetl ; but these are more expensive, and not better for 

 the purpose, than the former. The distances at which osiers for baskets or 

 wickerwork ought to be planted are IS in. between the rows, and 12 in. 

 apart in the rows. This distance will not be too thick for at least five or six 

 years; but, after that period, every alternate plant should be stubbed up; 

 which will leave those remaining at 2 ft. apart in the rows." (Ibid.,' p. 529.) 

 " Osier plantations," Sang continues, " must be carefully hoed and cleaned 

 every year. Nothing contributes more to the raising of a good crop of twigs, 

 after due preparation of the soil, than keeping it and the plants clean. The 

 stools should be carefully attended to annually, from the first year of pro- 

 ducing a crop of twigs, in order to keep them clear of rotten stumps, and not 

 to allow them to be overcrowded at tlie bottoms of the shoots. When these 

 have become too numerous, they should be carefully thinned out, and also cut 

 down, leaving only an eye or two at the bottom of each, until they be dimi- 

 nished to such a number as the stool is capable of supporting with vigour 

 throughout the season. A basket-maker finds more service from one shoot of 

 Gft. or 8ft. in length, than from four of 3ft. in length; and one of the first 

 dimensions will not exhaust the stool or the land so much as four of the 

 others. The proper season for cleaning and thinning the stocks is from the 

 1st of March to the middle of April." (Ibid., p. 530.) The rationale of 

 choosing this season for the operation of cleaning the plants is, that, if it were 

 performed in the autumn, the germs of the buds existing at the base of the 

 small shoots cleaned off" would swell in the course of the winter, and be 

 liable to throw out shoots in the following spring ; whereas, by delaying the 

 cutting off" of these till the sap is in motion, the germs remain dormant, the 



