970 



AMERICAN FORESTRY 



a serious matter with people of moderate means, it is not 

 an unmixed evil, for the more a person pays to save a 

 tree, the more he is likely to love all trees and to help to 

 save them. Another complaint that commonly reached 

 me vtras that the tree doctors' system of charging by the 



Phot* by J. Horace McFarland. 



A POOR VIEW OF WOODS FROM OUTSIDE 



The ordinarv woodlot has a sharp browsing line made by cattle. The 

 commercial forest is still more artificial, especially when composed of a 

 single kind of foreign tree, set in rows and trimmed up. Neither 

 type has charm because one can see straight through the woods and 

 nothing is left to the imagination. 



day or hour gives them a selfish interest in making as 

 much work as possible. Consequently, they are said to 

 put a lot of expense into old wrecks that have little 

 beauty or other value. City foresters declare that the 

 average street would be improved by cutting out about 



half the trees, but a man dislikes sacrificing a tree into 

 which he has put a lot of money. Landscape gardeners 

 assert that they often have trouble about cutting or im- 

 proving views because of trees that have been much 

 patched by menders. I believe that the tree surgeons can 

 be often employed to advantage in their specialty, but I 

 have yet to meet one who understands the principles of 

 "landscape forestry," as people are now beginning to call 

 the art of managing woodlands for pleasure rather than 

 profit. For the best advice, owners should turn to those 

 landscape gardeners who have special knowledge of this 

 subject. 



DRAINAGE OF WET WOODS 



One of the first principles in the design of pleasure 

 woods is to make them healthful and comfortable. There 

 are generally swampy spots where mosquitoes breed, and 

 some of these may be the malaria-breeding kind. A good 

 landscape gardener understands enough about engineer- 

 ing to solve such problems, without the needless destruc- 

 tion of beauty which engineers commonly inflict. It is 

 easy to drain woods too thoroughly, so that the water- 

 loving flowers will not thrive. The landscape gardener 

 is always on the watch for a chance to make a water-lily 

 pool by digging out part of a swamp. In such case the 

 mosquito problem is solved by means of goldfish. An- 

 other point the engineer is likely to miss is a chance for 

 a bog garden, where the finest hardy orchids, pitcher 

 plants, and fringed gentians can be grown in beautiful 

 sphagnum moss. These bog gardens are not as wet as 



Photo by A. C. Eldredge. 



A BETTER VIEW OF WOODS FROM THE OUTSIDE 

 A border of shrubbery makes a piece of woods look deep, rich and mvsterions. The fringe at the left is composed mostly of Western crab- 

 apples, Pyrus loensis, like the one in bloom at the right. 



