1 72 BRITISH FOREST TREES 



take place in single individuals scattered throughout the 

 whole beech forest, so as to gain to the fullest extent the 

 advantages derivable from the ruling species, though care 

 must be taken not to introduce it in such numbers that it 

 may form canopy for itself to the detriment or ultimate 

 suppression of the beech. When the oak has been scat- 

 tered too thickly along with the beech, all indifferently deve- 

 loped individuals should be cut out early, so that on the 

 better classes of soil not more than thirty-five to forty per 

 acre should attain the age of a hundred to a hundred and 

 twenty years ; but the better development of these should 

 be carefully tended during all thinnings out. In many 

 places strong transplants of 6 to y-J- feet high, are put out 

 every 16 feet in rows about 120 to 150 feet apart ; in other 

 localities a preference is given to one or two-year-old 

 seedlings notched in at every 15 to 20 feet x 15 to 20 feet, 

 whilst in other places again small groups and knots of 

 transplants three to four feet high are scattered here and 

 there in patches wherever there are blanks in the young 

 beech seedling growth which show good soil. This latter 

 method is generally preferred on cool northern slopes, or on 

 somewhat limy soils, where the growth of oak is not only 

 slower than on warmer exposures, or milder loamy or sandy 

 soils, and where at the same time the growth of the beech 

 is more luxuriant than on most other soils or situations. 



In cases where the oak needs any protection against the 

 beech, it is usually during the pole-forest stage of 

 development that tending is most requisite, although 

 where the soil is somewhat deficient in depth, or in mineral 

 strength, the need of assistance is often noticeable even in 

 the thicket stage of growth. Thus, while on the better 

 classes of soil, oak remains predominant, on inferior 

 localities the beech is naturally of quicker development, 

 and unless the former is scattered here and there in circular 



