I/O THE NEW FORESTRY. 



and useless. In the system of thinning proposed here, and 

 practised on the Continent, the numerous thinnings conducted 

 every few years on Brown's system are embraced in one or 

 two thinnings. This gets rid of the expense of frequent 

 and useless repetitions and allows time for the trees to reach a 

 useful size, when thinning becomes really necessary. What 

 the value of the thinnings might be under the dense system of 

 culture we have had no means of knowing in this country, but 

 judging by what we have seen in Germany of examples that 

 could be easily repeated in Britain, and by the fact that the 

 nearly four thousand trees per acre, at the twentieth year, are 

 reduced in number by nearly three thousand, by the fortieth 

 year, in about two thinnings, we can certainly conceive of crops 

 in which the thinnings would pay well in the time specified, 

 at prices such as have long been common. The disposal of 

 three thousand poles, however small, between the twentieth 

 and fortieth years, as shown in Schlich's table, means bulk, 

 and a transaction of considerable value, as timber sales go, and 

 takes no account of subsequent thinnings or of the ultimate 

 crop. t 



Coming to the third and subsequent thinnings, or rather 

 falls of timber, the same rules should be observed as before in 

 maintaining the overhead canopy, removing the worst trees, 

 and reserving the finest and largest. By middle-age, growth 

 will have become less vigorous and the overhead canopy will 

 not be so soon restored where interrupted by the removal of 

 any trees ; but by this time the effects of judicious crowding 

 in the earlier stages will have been to a great extent secured 

 in a clean height-growth, and if a little more room is afforded 

 to the tops it will help to promote girth without encouraging 

 side growth, the stage being passed at which lateral growth 

 may be feared. Oaks and some other broad-leaved species 

 <io sometimes push out a twiggy growth from their trunks in 

 old age, when the forest becomes thin, but they hardly affect 

 the quality of the timber. In conclusion, it may just be added 

 that much will depend on general management and a proper 

 comprehension of his duties by the forester. The lines of 

 management are easily understood and should not be departed 

 from. The foundation of the crop is laid at the beginning. 

 The aim should be not so much a crop of mature timber at 

 some indefinite period, but a remunerative return from the 

 plantation as soon as possible. 



In thinning established plantations care should be taken 

 not to thin too severely at any one time. Sudden and 



