1828 



Canadian Forestry Journal, August, 1918 



nificent silver firs at Longleat in Wilt- 

 shire, many of them six feet in dia- 

 meter, are falling. From the mag- 

 nificent high forests of Spanish chestnut 

 trees at Welbeck Abbey at least a 

 million feet are^to be cut. 



The Home of Trees. 



These details give'but a faint sug- 

 gestion of Avhat is going on from one 

 end of Great Britain to the other. 

 Without having put foot on England 

 the destructive influence of the 

 Germans is seen in the disappearance 

 of its incomparable woodland beau- 

 ties. It has been largely due to its 

 trees and woodlands that England 

 has always ranked among the most 

 beautiful of European countries. Its 

 climate and its extraordinaiy variety 

 of soil have been peculiarly favor- 

 able for the growth of trees in unusual 

 variety. Its freedom from great ex- 

 tremes of heat and cold have made 

 it the home of trees unknown in many 

 parts of northern Europe. In its 

 limited area a greater variety is to be 

 seen than can be observed in immense- 

 ly larger areas on the Continent. 



In a journey of fifty to eighty 

 miles from London to the Channel 

 one finds hedgerow elms, thorns and 

 oaks of the meadows, silver birches, 

 chestnuts and many conifers of the 

 lower commons; the willows, alders 

 and poplars of the valley: the ancient 

 thorns and hollies of the higher com- 

 mons; the beechwoods of the North 

 Downs; the white bean, yew, juniper 

 and box on the greens and ridges and 

 the forests of mighty Scotch pines, 

 silver firs, larch and the great oaks of 



the Weald; the conifers and chest- 

 nuts of the Hastings sand forest 

 region, and then the elder, ash and 

 thorn of the eastern end of the South 

 Downs, and the beech, birch, sweet 

 chestnut, ash and mighty yew at 

 their western end. An'd this variety 

 is not only typical of the nearby 

 counties, but more or less of all 

 England, Scotland and Wales. 



With the exception of certain exotic 

 trees brought here and there, perhaps 

 by the Romans, it is pretty clear 

 that the trees down to the seventeenth 

 century were all native. In that 

 century, the conifers were introduced, 

 and Develyn, the great authority on 

 British forestry, includes in his list 

 the Scotch fir, the only native of the 

 family, the silver fir, the Weymouth 

 pine, the spruce and the larch. In 

 the eighteenth century large plant- 

 ings were made of the larch. This 

 introduction of the larch and other 

 conifers not only added new features 

 to the beauty of the English wood- 

 lands, but also has proved to be as 

 great a resource of England at war 

 as the hearts of oak of old. 



While most of England's wood- 

 lands had been created primarily 

 for game coverts and landscape ef- 

 fects, state forests were for cen- 

 turies cultivated to meet the needs 

 of the navy. The oak of the Forest of 

 Dean has been known as the best 

 ship timber in the world, and English 

 oak is still the finest for that purpose, 

 while the best of the soft woods, 

 spruce and pine, is second only to the 

 finest woods produced in northern 

 Europe. — New York Sun. 



Conquerors Exploit Russian Forests 



The thoroughness with which the 

 Germans have set about to exploit 

 the forests of that part of Russia 

 which they have occupied is made 

 evident in an account published in 

 Traevaru Industrien, written by W. 

 Franz, and translated by the Timber 

 Trades Journal of London. The ac- 

 count says: 



"We arrived from Warsaw via 

 Brest-Litovsk over the Bug at the 



Gajnowska station, on the western 

 edge of the extensive and valuable 

 forest, which forms the southwest 

 corner of Lithuania. After a further 

 journey of an hour, we came to 

 Bjelovjerska, a large clearing with 

 three small villages and a hunting- 

 box, formerly belonging to the Tsar. 

 In the building, which is surrounded 

 by a beautiful park, there now re- 

 sides a German militany^ forest admin- 



