92 THE NEW FORESTRY. 



CHAPTER VII. 



SPECIES MOST SUITABLE FOR PLANTING 



AS TIMBER TREES IN GREAT BRITAIN 



AND IRELAND. 



Number of Useful Species. Kinds of Timber in most demand. List of 



Species. 



SECTION I. NUMBER OF USEFUL SPECIES. 



ACCORDING to some writers, the principal timber-trees (hard- 

 woods) recognised by botanists as being of spontaneous growth 

 in the British Islands, exclusive of their varieties, number 

 twenty-seven. The number of species actually in demand, 

 however, as timber-trees, does not amount to more than half 

 the botanists' list or thereabout, and in the list given in this 

 chapter only the well-known kinds will be described, and a few 

 others that promise to be good timber-trees. Lists of coni- 

 ferous species given by writers as usually planted in this 

 country, together with such newer kinds as are sufficiently 

 hardy and said to be worth cultivation in Great Britain and 

 Ireland, include seventy-seven species, and this number will 

 also be much reduced. 



The most judiciously compiled nurseryman's lists of trans- 

 planted forest trees contain between thirty 7 and forty species 

 altogether, including the thorn and hazel, and this number, 

 Schlich, in his " Manual," vol. ii., reduces to twenty, but thinks 

 a few less important species might possibly be added. In 

 Germany less than a dozen would probably comprise all the 

 species grown, while in Britain, as is well-known, a few species 

 really supply the chief demand. 



SECTION II. KINDS OF TIMBER IN MOST DEMAND. 



At the present time we have no means of knowing what 

 the total timber consumption in Great Britain amounts to, 



