ECONOMIC VALUE OF FOREST FLORA 209 



suffers much from snow during the winter, and partly 

 because the soil or local climate is too wet and cold for 

 its success. In mixtures of faster growing trees, such as 

 larch, Douglas fir, or any of the more rapid growing 

 conifers, Scots pine seldom or never reaches maturity, 

 and is of little use when taken out as thinnings. To 

 some extent creosoting has increased its value when 

 young, but it is still far from being a profitable tree, 

 except when grown as a pure crop, and under conditions 

 which enable it to reach maturity. 



Similar remarks might be made about Corsican pine, 

 except that it grows at a faster rate, succeeds better in 

 windy districts, and produces a cleaner bole with open 

 order than Scots pine. Its timber is probably not so 

 fine-grained as Scots pine under any circumstances, but 

 for limestone soils it is certainly the best pine that can 

 be used, provided that the necessary precautions are taken 

 in transplanting. 



It is probable that no more promising timber tree has 

 ever been introduced into the British Isles than Sitka 

 spruce. Until the last twenty years or so this fact had 

 scarcely been recognised to the full, but there seems little 

 reason to doubt that this is one of the very few introduc- 

 tions which have exceeded expectations. 



Coming from a remote corner of the American con- 

 tinent, and probably not valued above other species in its 

 own home to any great extent, it was not until it had 

 been planted under conditions, which to most trees would 

 have been fatal, that the qualities of Sitka spruce became 

 of general knowledge. On peaty or wet soils, at high 

 altitudes, and along the western seaboard, no tree appears 

 to succeed so well in Scotland, Ireland, and the north of 

 England, and only in the driest parts of the British Isles 

 does it show any sign of failure. On the west coast of 

 Jutland, Schleswig-Holstein, etc., the same superiority of 



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