276 OUR FORESTS AND WOODLANDS 



of small larch poles is often extremely profitable, 

 without any professional skill being necessary to 

 grow them. Of somewhat larger growth, so as 

 to give poles of three inches or more at the 

 top-end, larch is also highly remunerative as 

 pit-wood for props in the mines wherever col- 

 lieries exist, Scots pine coming next to it in 

 demand for this purpose. Indeed, in mining 

 districts almost all sorts of small wood can find 

 a fair market, provided they average about three 

 to five inches in diameter. Apart, however, from 

 exceptional cases, and from purely local considera- 

 tions as to the market for disposal of the wood- 

 land crops grown, Continental experience on a 

 much larger scale than is possible in Britain has 

 shown that mixed crops are preferable to pure 

 crops of any one or other kind of trees ; because 

 in all cases of suitable mixtures the growth of the 

 trees is better, and, as regards conifers especially, 

 larch, pine, and fir are then less exposed to danger 

 from snowbreak, windfall, insects, and fungous 

 diseases. It would run into too much space to 

 consider, in anything like detail, the conditions 

 under which such mixed crops can best be grown ; 

 but it may at any rate be remarked that one of 



