312 ENGLISH ESTATE FORESTRY 



The forester who has to deal with exposed hillsides, upon 

 the face or shoulders of which the wind sweeps with full 

 force, has to make an early choice between two methods : he 

 must either accustom his trees to the situation from the first 

 by giving them plenty of room, and thus favouring the for- 

 mation of stout, short stems, which stand up better against 

 the wind than any ; or he must adopt a system of thinning 

 and felling, which will avoid all dangers to surrounding or 

 surviving trees. The first method involves the production 

 of coarse and inferior timber, and is only adapted for shelter 

 belts, and woods maintained for landscape effect, where the 

 production of saleable timber is of secondary consideration. 

 Where the latter, however, is the object in view, wind must 

 be guarded against by arranging the fellings in such a way 

 that the sides of the blocks, or area suddenly exposed, should 

 be on the east, and not on the west side of the plantation. 

 When so arranged, recently planted ground is always sheltered 

 by the older wood to the windward, and, when the latter in its 

 turn has to disappear, the trees are too small, and stand too 

 thickly on the ground, to suffer from the exposure. When 

 a long and unbroken westerly slope has to be cleared and 

 replanted, therefore, the proper course to adopt, if other 

 circumstances will permit, is that of cutting in long narrow 

 strips across the face, and commencing at the top of the 

 slope, replanting these strips as soon as possible. Where 

 horizontal strips do not allow the timber to be removed 

 conveniently, they may be cut obliquely across the hill, or at 

 an angle of about forty-five degrees to its slope, the great point 

 to guard against being direct exposure of the older trees in 

 any way. 



Where the ground is very broken and irregular, forming 

 a series of exposed ridges across the line of the wind, the 

 retention of permanent shelter belts across their crest is also 

 advisable. These belts should consist of hardy, deep-rooting, 

 or bushy trees, which will break the wind where most 

 required, and so prevent that sudden exposure which would 

 follow clear felling. But the necessity for such belts is most 

 urgent at the margins of plantations on exposed sites. In 

 some cases the retention of a row of outside trees will provide 

 all the shelter necessary, and break the wind to the desired 



