112 Germany. 



developed among the experiment stations in securing 

 a true basis for the practice of thinning. 



New ideas were introduced through French influ- 

 ence and by others independently in the latter part 

 of the eighties, when the distinction between the final 

 harvest crop (Fr. elite, le haut) and the nurse crop 

 (le bas) was introduced.* 



The physiological reasons for the practice of thin- 

 ning upon experimental basis, advanced were by the 

 botanists Goeppert and R. Hartig, and among fores- 

 ters, the names of Kraft, Lorey, Haug, Borggreve, 

 Wagener, and others are intimately connected with 

 the very active discussion of the subject lately going 

 on in the magazines. Thinnings have become such 

 an important part of the income of forest adminis- 

 trations (25 to 40% of the total yield) that the promi- 

 nence given to the subject is well justified, and a more 

 modern conception of the advantages of thinnings 

 and especially of severer thinnings is gaining ground. 



The proposition, now much ventilated, of severe 

 opening up near the end of the rotation, in order to 

 secure an accelerated increment (Lichtungshiebe) is, 

 however, much older; Hossfeld, in 1824, and Jager 

 in 1850, advocated this measure for financial reasons, 

 while Koenig and Pressler anticipated the develop- 

 ment of an individual tree management by pruning, 

 and differentiation of final harvest and nurse crop, 

 a method which is working itself out at the present 

 time. 



* The conception of such subdivision and the English nomenclature was inde- 

 pendently first employed by he writer in his Report for 1887, as Chief of Forestry 

 Division, when discussing planting plans for the prairies. 



