: 2; BRITISH FORESTRY, PAST AND FUTURE 



the most elementary acquaintance with the methods of 

 rational systematic forestry, whose object is the production 

 from a given area of the maximum amount of timber of the 

 highest quality, due regard being had to a consistent rela- 

 tionship between the cost of production and the value of 

 the produce. The main defect of British management has 

 taken the form of having the woods too open, that is to say 

 the growing stock has been so low as to be incapable of 

 furnishing a normal return of timber, and therefore a full 

 soil rental. A full return can no more be looked for from 

 an under-stocked forest than from an under-stocked farm. 

 Various causes have been at work to produce this result. 

 The oak has played an important part in British forestry 

 in the past, and the timber that was wanted for the ribs 

 and knees of ships could best be furnished by trees that 

 had been allotted ample room to develop large outstretch- 

 ing limbs. In the west and north of England, and in Scot- 

 land, larch is the tree which has been the chief object of the 

 forester's attention. This species is intolerant of shade and 

 crowding, and fine clean stems are produced in compara- 

 tively open woods. The ash is another tree with precisely 

 similar requirements, and English ash timber has no equal 

 for many important purposes. It has been alleged, and 

 with the allegation I entirely agree, that, valuable as these 

 trees are, they have had a detrimental effect on British 

 silviculture. It is they and especially oak and larch 

 that have set the standard of the management of our wood- 

 lands. It has been argued that what has been good for 

 oak and larch cannot be bad for beech, spruce, silver fir, and 

 other species of inferior value, with the consequence that 

 a rule-of -thumb system of silviculture has prevailed which 

 has resulted in the production of good timber from light- 

 demanding species, and bad timber from the opposite group. 

 Other causes have been at work to keep our woods too 

 thin. With very few exceptions landlords in the past have 

 had their woods managed with an eye to s^ort. The situa- 

 tion of the plantation, the species of trees, the extent and 



