LEAVES AND TWIGS. 697 



before he cuts the wood into lengths with a billhook or an old 

 sabre, and binds them up into faggots. 



The quantity of utilisable needle-litter depends on the 

 species of tree, the system of management, the method of 

 utilisation and age of the tree. Silver-fir and spruce yield 

 more litter than do pines. Pines subdivide their crowns into 

 boughs, while silver-fir and spruce have only one subdivision of 

 their branches, so that besides possessing fewer needles, there 

 are many branches in pines that are too thick for litter. 



Silver-firs and spruces also have many little branches on 

 their boles, that are absent in pines. As regards the system 

 of management, the more open selection forest produces more 

 litter than does even-aged high forest. The use of branch-litter 

 is practised usually wherever selection forests prevail, as in the 

 Tyrolese and Swiss Alps, private forests in the Fichtelgebirge, 

 the Franconian Forest and Schwarzwald in Wurtemberg, etc. 



Many Alpine forests are so impoverished by the utilisation 

 of branch litter, that they are no longer able to satisfy 

 moderate demands for this material. In the forests of 

 Franconia and the Fichtelgebirge, and in many parts of the 

 Schwarzwald, every woodcutter by moderate lopping has 

 obtained for generations about 1 to 1J \vaggon-loads of branch- 

 litter per acre annually, from the selection forests, without 

 any fear of the supply being reduced. 



As regards the age of the Irees that are lopped, it is evident 

 that in pole-woods, the power of reproducing branches after 

 lopping is the greatest, and that the older the trees, the fewer 

 small branches are available. 



Reduction in the yield of a forest occurs only when the 

 trees are lopped extensively up to their crowns ; it is how- 

 ever certain, that, owing to the formation of occluding lumps 

 on the boles of trees, their use for timber and especially for 

 planks is prejudiced. 



Utilisation of the finer roots of conifers, especially of the 

 spruce, involves great injury to all trees, except for those 

 which are to be felled very soon. The practice is confined chiefly 

 to stray shoots of hazel, Viburnum Lantana, etc., which are 

 removed by trespassers. Roots and shoots are heated (baked), 

 twisted on their axes, and used as tough, coarse withes. 



