226 Studies in Forestry [CHAP. x. 



then ultimately harvested numbers about thirty-six to forty- 

 eight stems per acre, which on good soil yield valuable and 

 remunerative assortments of timber \ Where soil and situation 

 are good enough to fulfil the demands made on them, there 

 can be little doubt that this system of underplanting with 

 a shade-bearing species, and partially clearing the main crop 

 from time to time, is the method best calculated to produce 

 timber of the highest value for technical purposes, and to yield 

 the most favourable returns financially from the capital repre- 

 sented by the soil, together with the growing crop. 



Scots Pine. For the practice of this method a good deep 

 soil is necessary, as it differs essentially from the custom, 

 common on poorer qualities of soil, of thinning out crops 

 during their twentieth to fiftieth year of age and underplanting 

 them with Spruce or other suitable shade-bearing species. In 

 the latter case they are often allowed to grow on to maturity 

 without any further thinning or interruption of the canopy to 

 speak of; but, though they continue to improve in growth and 

 form, this is due to the beneficial influence of the undergrowth 

 both on the soil and the standards. As a good formation of 

 the crown is requisite for Scots Pine, in order to enable it to 

 continue for a long time in active energetic increment, 

 thinnings should be made towards the end of the pole-forest 

 stage of growth, and afterwards repeated whenever there seems 

 any danger of the crowns interfering with each other. Under- 

 planting should also be here carried out as soon as the 

 thinnings have taken place with a view to the formation of 



1 The following passage from London's work already quoted (p. 1809) is 

 interesting, although not quite intelligible as regards the largest scantlings 

 being produced at 130 years of age though if larger be read in place of 

 the largest the statement readily becomes intelligible : 



' A writer in the Gardener s Magazine states that Mr. Larkin, an eminent 

 purveyor of timber for ship-building, stated, when examined before the 

 East India Shipping Committee, that, in situations the most favourable for 

 ship timber (the Weald of Kent, for example^, the most profitable time to 

 cut Oak was at ninety years old ; as, though the largest scantlings were 

 produced at 130 years' growth, the increase in the forty additional years 

 did not pay 2 per cent. (Card. Mag. vol. xi. p. 690.)' 



