258 THE DEER FORESTS OF SCOTLAND. 



one thousand acres, may be of use to forest owners 

 contemplating the formation of woods. The one 

 under discussion was planted in 1865-6, on the 

 eastern slope of the valley of the Broom, and 

 commencing at an elevation of but fifty feet above 

 the sea, it rises to an altitude of one thousand feet. 

 The trees are chiefly Scotch pine and larch, although 

 in the best soil, on the lower ground, a variety of 

 hard wood trees were put in, such as ash, oak, elm, 

 copper beech, birch, maple, sycamore, rowan, and 

 chestnut, each being given a chance of seeing how 

 they would fare in the Braemore soil. The height of 

 the now thirty-year-old trees varies from a maximum 

 of fifty-one feet, a larch, to a minimum of fifty inches 

 in height, with a maximum girth of sixty-six inches 

 to a minimum of six inches. This extraordinary 

 variation is due to the richness of the low level 

 soil as compared with nearly total absence of any soil 

 at all at the highest points. The deer were kept 

 strictly out of this plantation until the trees had 

 reached a height of about fifteen feet, when they were 



