

XIV 



THE TRANSPLANT NURSERY 



A TRANSPLANT NURSERY may be defined as ground into 

 which seedling trees are removed in order that a better 

 root system may be developed prior to placing them in 

 their permanent home the removal from the seed-bed to 

 the transplant nursery occurring during the first few years 

 of the seedling's life. If trees are allowed to remain long 

 where the seed was sown the chances for successful removal 

 diminish rapidly as the years go by. It is practically impos- 

 sible to remove any but the very smallest without serious 

 mutilation of their roots, and this mutilation unavoidably 

 happens to the most important part of the root system, the 

 small fibrous portion. It is these fibrous roots that send 

 out the little hairs with microscopic mouths which suck in 

 the moisture and mineral food, and it is these roots that 

 suffer. most in removal of the tree from its birthplace. If 

 the tree is removed from the seed-bed when young, its 

 roots have not spread far and their renewal is necessarily 

 close to the stem, and if a second removal occurs within 

 two or three years, the roots will be found so compact that 

 comparatively few of them will be seriously injured. Such 

 being the case the tree will be far better able to withstand 

 the shock of removal to the forest than if it had few such 

 roots, which would be the case had no removal to the trans- 

 plant nursery occurred. Commercial nurserymen have long 

 acted upon this fact, and they seldom send out either fruit 

 or ornamental trees that have not been transplanted once 

 or of tener frequently three times. 



The necessity for this treatment attaches itself with 

 greater significance to coniferous than to broadleaf trees. 

 If the former are allowed to grow without disturbance of 



