136 Studies in Forestry [CHAP. vr. 



bearing species, Beech, Hornbeam, and Silver Fir, offer in 

 general but slight difficulty. In mixed crops these trees 

 would usually be reproduced naturally and cleared away as 

 soon as possible, thus leaving the young seedling crop to 

 grow up as underwood under the light-demanding standards 

 of other kinds of trees left to thicken into stems of fine 

 marketable dimensions. 



In the regeneration of mixed woods it will be almost in- 

 variably found advisable to plant out large transplants of the 

 more valuable species of timber trees ; for their disposal through- 

 out the soil-protecting, ruling species, and the advantage in age 

 and development which it is desired to give them over it, are 

 much better ensured by this than by any other means. But, 

 at the same time, wherever special conditions of soil render 

 the natural regeneration of the light-demanding species desir- 

 able, this can also be effected : and any blanks that remain 

 afterwards can easily be filled up with one or other of the 

 shade-bearing and soil-protecting kinds of trees. 



8. By Admixture of Various Kinds of trees in one series of 

 Crops, the operations of tending, harvesting, &<r., can be conducted 

 most economically. This is another advantage of an almost 

 axiomatic nature. Suppose, for example, that any landowner has 

 800 acres of woods, which he wishes to have stocked with the 

 four kinds of trees, Larch, Scots Pine, Spruce, and Silver Fir, 

 worked with a rotation of say 80 years each. If formed into 

 pure forests, when once the crops were in full working order so 

 as to yield annual falls of timber, there would need to be four 

 distinct series of annual crops from 0-80 years old, in place 

 of one series of mixed crops of the same ages ; and all opera- 

 tions of thinning, tending, felling, extracting, and reproducing 

 would have annually to be carried out in four different direc- 

 tions and over small areas of 2\ acres each, instead of being 

 concentrated on one compartment or compact area of 10 acres 

 in extent for each annual crop. This latter method represents 

 a very great saving both in time and money; hence when 



