I 



THE NEW FORESTRY. 57 



In Yorkshire and elsewhere, before iron was substituted for 

 timber to the extent it is now, and before foreign timber 

 became common, good home-grown timber fetched a much 

 higher price than it does at present, and labour and cultural 

 expenses were less, as many estate records could show. The 

 demand in those days was good, and no doubt led to the 

 undue thinning of woods on many estates, and the production 

 of rough timber in that which was left to grow. In fact the 

 decay now noticeable in many old woods is due to nothing else 

 but exposure by over-thinning after the trees had reached 

 mature age. If a strict rotation system of clearing off and 

 re-planting had been followed, instead of a timid system of 

 repeated thinnings and mismanagement, in all probability our 

 woods would have been in a very different condition now. It 

 is plain to the most casual observer that in many old oak 

 woods the lower branches (which in park trees would be the 

 oldest and the largest) are much smaller than the branches 

 which form the tops of the trees, and the explanation is that 

 the lower branches have been produced at a much later period 

 than the tops, their production being due to the broken over- 

 head canopy encouraging the late growth. These branches 

 often clothe the trunks of old oaks from top to bottom, and 

 have a pleasing effect to the eye, but they are in the wrong 

 place, and in aged trees are produced at the expense of the 

 proper top, as they absorb the sap as it ascends, and which 

 should flow to the top of the tree. French foresters, according 

 to Bagneris, call such growths " epicormic branches," and prune 

 them off, believing them to be one cause of old oaks becoming 

 stag-headed prematurely. 



The past system of thinning oak woods until the trees left 

 were too few, too far apart, and consequently exposed at a 

 period when they were least able to bear exposure, has, no 

 doubt, led to premature decay in the trees left in many woods. 

 Trees now going off fast at their tops, and becoming hollow 

 in their trunks, might still have been in good health and 

 adding to their size and value if thinning had been arrested as 

 soon as it was seen that it was going to open the wood out too 

 much. Clear cutting in sections should then have been begun, 

 followed by re-planting, so as to keep the area fully stocked. 



