204 FOREST PLANTING. 



CHAPTER IV. 



HOW TO BIND THE SHIFTING SAND ON THE 

 MOUNTAINS. 



To bind the shifting sand on the plains and render it 

 compact, adapting it to tree-culture, is a difficult task. 

 But this work is still more difficult when it has to be 

 done in mountainous localities. In the plains we have 

 only to fight the winds, which cause the sand to drift; 

 but in the mountains, besides this, we have to overcome 

 the troubles arising from the unevenness of the soil and 

 its favoring the formation of destructive water currents 

 during rainy weather. 



Wherever the sandy soil is sufficiently deep and pos- 

 sesses the necessary components for securing the growth 

 of trees, the work of planting should be at once com- 

 menced, this being the only means to prevent the loose 

 sand from drifting, both in the plains and mountains. 

 But when wind and water currents have swept away 

 every bit of soil and vegetation from the slopes, and 

 nothing is left except the rubble-stones, which origi- 

 nated, during past ages, by the corroding action of the 

 glaciers upon the rocky surface, which formed the ground 

 upon which the sand settled, there occur difficulties 

 which appear to be nearly insurmountable. But " for- 

 est science " has been brought to bear upon the discov- 

 ery of appropriate expedients, and found them in soms 

 grasses which will grow in such places, producing in 

 due time a cover that will later develop into a sward. If 

 this cover be left for some time undisturbed and not 

 exposed to the attacks of pasturing farm animals, there 

 will appear such beneficial accumulations from above 



