Development of Silviculture. 59 



disappointing, for this practice, being applied to the 

 shallow-rooted spruce, produced the inevitable result, 

 namely, the seed trees were thrown by the winds. 



This experience led to the prescription (in 1565) 

 in the Palatinate to leave, besides seed trees, parts of 

 the other stand for protection against wind damage; 

 later, wind protection was sought by leaving parcels 

 standing on all four sides, giving rise to a checker- 

 board progress of fellings or a group system of repro- 

 duction, which by the middle of the 18th century 

 had developed into the regular strip system, applied 

 in Austria (1766) to fir and spruce, and in Prussia 

 (1764) to pine. And this marginal seeding method 

 remained for a long time the favorite method for 

 the conifers. 



To avoid long strips and distribute the fellings 

 more conveniently, v. Berlepsch (in Kassel) recom- 

 mended (in 1760) the cutting in echelons (curtain 

 method, Kulissenhieb), which insured better seed- 

 ing, but also increased danger from windfalls, and was 

 never much practiced, the disadvantages of the 

 method being shown up especially in the Prussian 

 Forest Order of 1788. 



In the first half of the 18th century it was recog- 

 nized that the wind danger would be considerably 

 reduced by making the fellings progress from East 

 or Northeast to West. The conception of a regular, 

 properly located felling series was first elaborated in 

 the Harz mountains in 1745 by von Langen, who 

 also accentuated the necessity of preserving a wind 

 mantle on exposed situations. Both of these pro- 

 positions reappear in the Prussian Order of 1780, 



