Cupressus 



1207 



soils, a cold and wet peat being, according to Kent, the only one unfavourable 

 to it. 1 



It is not, so far as we know, subject to any fungoid disease in this country. 



It endures heavy shade and requires close planting to keep its trunk free from 

 large branches. It has a tendency to fork, especially when grown from cuttings. 

 Judging from what I have seen, the beech will probably be its best nurse, though on 

 damper ground alder might be preferable, and I should expect it to be one of the 

 best evergreens to use for under-planting, or filling up gaps in thin woods. In Earl 

 Bathurst s park at Cirencester a large number were planted on the edge of one of 

 the broad grass drives leading west from the " Ten Rides," and these, surrounded 

 and shaded by beech trees, have grown to be over 60 ft. high in about fifty years or 

 less, and for the most part have trunks which are much less branchy than spruce or 

 silver fir would be in similar conditions. These trees are growing on thin dry oolite 

 soil not more than 6 to 8 in. deep, and as Mr. R. Anderson tells me were 

 planted in 1864. The average height of twelve of them in January 1909 was 55 ft., 

 and the average girth 3 ft. If we estimate their cubic contents at about 10 ft. each, 

 one might reasonably expect to grow on this land 200 to the acre, giving 2000 cubic 

 feet per acre in fifty years. Our Plate 98, of Larches, near the Woodhouse in 

 the same park, shows trees under similar conditions. 



For avenues, Lawson cypress seems very suitable, provided that trees of uniform 

 habit and equal growth are selected, and for this purpose they should be frequently 

 transplanted before their final selection, as in the nursery some vigorous trees 

 generally take the lead and keep it, whilst others remain comparatively dwarfish. 



As a cheap and ornamental hedge plant it has many advantages. Its shade of 

 green is more agreeable than any other evergreen used for this purpose, and its 

 feathery branchlets are more graceful than the rigid shoots of the holly or yew. 

 According to a writer in Woods and Forests, small plants, 1 8 in. to 4 ft. high, should 

 be used for this purpose, as they can be clipped and headed back until they become 

 dense at the base. They may be planted, 12 to 18 in. apart, according to the size of 

 the plants. Such hedges are best clipped in early September. 



In the eastern United States, Lawson cypress thrives from New York south- 

 wards ; but in New England it merely survives in sheltered situations, and Sargent 2 

 says that it cannot be used for general planting. 



In Germany 3 Lawson cypress has been tried in forest plots at different 

 stations in Prussia, the total area being about thirty acres, and at Grafrath in 

 Bavaria. Judging from an experience of twenty years, the wood grown in Germany 

 is as good as that of Oregon. Heartwood begins to form in the tenth year with the 

 characteristic fragrant odour of the timber in America. Trees, which had succumbed 

 to the worst enemy of this species, Agaricus melleus, were successfully used for 

 palings, without removing the bark. Another fungoid disease, Pestalozzia funerea, 



1 It grows, however, on deep bog at Churchill, Armagh, where it had been planted with Scots pine and birch, and 

 numerous natural seedlings sprang up which were used for transplanting on other parts of the estate. (A. H.) 



1 Garden and Forest, x.430 (1897). 



s Cf. Schwappach, Anbauversuche fremdl. Hoharten, 26 (1901) ; Mayr, Wald.- u. Parkbaume, 272, fig. 74 (1906) ; and 

 Unwin, Future Forest Trees, 93, fig. 2 (1905). 





