CHAPTER VII 



CONCERNING THE FORMATION AND GENERAL 

 TREATMENT OF MIXED WOODS 



IN the preceding chapter it was shown that although in pure 

 forests, where only one species of tree has mainly to be taken 

 into account, each block of woodland may have the advantage 

 of being easier to work as regards its tending, the harvesting of 

 its mature crop, and its regeneration (though not necessarily, 

 so far as the latter is concerned), yet such woods are much more 

 exposed to climatic dangers like extensive windfall over areas 

 covered with Spruce, or damage from snow and ice in Pine 

 tracts, or devastation from noxious insects, as in the case of 

 both Spruce and Pine, or fungoid diseases, as in Larch, Silver 

 Fir, Spruce, and Pine. Pure forests cripple and confine the 

 management to one kind of timber practically in any one 

 locality ; and if the market for that particular kind of wood 

 falls so as to become unremunerative, it is not easy all at once 

 to transform the woods into more profitable crops. 



It will in general, therefore, be considerably to the advan- 

 tage of landowners to avoid the formation of pure forests over 

 extensive areas, though it may sometimes happen that there 

 is very little free choice about the matter. Thus, when the 

 soil is too poor for mixed crops of Oak, Ash, Maple, Sycamore, 

 Elm, Larch, &c., to be grown along with Beech, Hornbeam, 

 Spruce, and Silver or Douglas Firs, the choice is often confined 

 to conifers alone, or on the poorest classes of soil to the Scots 



