496 



AMERICAN FORESTRY 



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Photo by H'arrcn H. Miller. 

 PURE OAK FOREST, CANTON OF CLOS. 



thinning, taking out from one-half to 

 two-thirds of the thick growth. Periodic 

 thinnings follow at intervals of ten 

 years, the general principle being to 

 keep the tops of the dominant trees so 

 that they will just meet when the next 

 thinning comes due, and to keep enough 

 of the sub-stage trees to protect the 

 trunks of the first-class ones from the 

 sun. None of these thinnings are 

 wasted, in fact nothing is ever wasted 

 in France, and the income from all 

 classes of thinnings amounts to two- 

 fifths of the market value of the final 

 crop. The thicket-stage trimmings com- 

 pete direct in the markets with coppice 

 products, and the others furnish lum- 

 ber of increasingly valuable sizes. 



ed at the end of the revolution, 

 which is at present taken at 60 years 

 for Sylvester pine, 75 for oak, and 100 

 for fir, the seed cut is made in the 

 nearest seed year for that canton (they 

 occur every two to five years for most 

 species) followed by the secondary cut, 



and then the terminal cut when the 

 new growth on the canton is established. 

 In a French standard forest of an hun- 

 dred cantons, each year sees one ter- 

 minal cut, one secondary cut, one seed- 

 ing cut and ten thinning cuts ; in all 

 thirteen cantons being cut over, so that 

 there is plenty of business going on even 

 though the cantons may be of only a 

 few hectares area each. 



As the system is one which we will 

 adopt in America for nearly all forests 

 not in close touch with rail facilities 

 (such as replanted barrens and worn 

 out pasturage), I will give here a few 

 generalizations as to how to set about 

 converting a wild American forest into 

 a French Standard forest. The first 

 desideratum is uniformity of species, 

 wherefore when you cut cord wood 

 from your woodlot or forest, replant 

 the spot liberally with the species you 

 have selected, preferably the dominant 

 species already placed there by nature 

 as survival of the fittest. The second 



