6 Some Problems of Re-afforestation. 



larch, and as a nurse, to be removed when about twenty years 

 old, it is of high value. 



Mr. 0. P. Ackers in Vol. vi. of the Quarterly Journal of 

 Forestry draws attention to the inferior power of resistance of 

 the Japanese larch in Gloucestershire to the excessive drought 

 of 1911. In the North of England in the same year it was little 

 affected, and his conclusion is that " the Japanese larch promises 

 to become a far more useful tree than the European, and to 

 give a crop of useful timber where the European could never 

 pay." 



The possibilities of the Japanese larch are well shown in the 

 report of the Judges on the Competition of Plantations in 

 Yorkshire in connection with the Royal Agricultural Society's 

 Show at Doncaster in 1912. 1 At the age of ten years the First 

 Prize plantation, at an altitude of 800 to 850 ft., had an average 

 height of 17 to 18 ft., with a girth in the middle of the stem 

 of 8 to 10 in. There was no trace of disease, and the accumu- 

 lation of leaf mould on the surface of the ground, combined 

 with complete suppression of surface growth, was very re- 

 markable. In the Quarterly Journal of Forestry for July, 

 1917, Mr. W. B. Havelock gives certain measurements of trees 

 in a wood of Japanese larch at Brocklesby, Lincolnshire. These 

 were planted in January, 1900, and after seventeen years' growth 

 the height was 40 to 45 ft., and the average girth at 5 ft. from 

 the ground was 19 in. 



Abies grandis. This is perhaps the fastest-growing of the 

 silver firs, and it is least affected by " Aphis," which makes the 

 common silver fir so difficult to establish even under a shelter 

 wood. All silver firs, however, are very sensitive to spring 

 frost, and their growth in youth is slow, so that they are not 

 so attractive from the commercial point of view as certain other 

 genera of conifers. They all bear a large amount of shade, and 

 are useful for underplanting. Their timber is inferior to that 

 of the spruce, but, given suitable conditions, some of them, 

 notably A. grandis, will give a much larger yield per acre. 



The Western Hemlock, Tsuga Albertiana (=Mer tens tana), 

 grows with great rapidity in most parts of the country, provided 

 the soil is not calcareous. It is much superior to the Canadian 

 hemlock (T. canadensis), which seldom retains a good leader, 

 and is apt to take the form of an overgrown bush. The 

 Western hemlock, on the other hand, has a particularly straight 

 stem, and although its leading shoot is apparently so delicate 

 it is rarely broken by the wind. The timber may be classed 

 with spruce. 



1 R.A.S.E. Journal, Vol. 73, 1912, p. 220. 



