'^SHOULD WE SOW OE PLANT !" 31 



to sotc except where it is impossible to plant} In other words, planting is 

 now the rule — sowing, the exception ; just the reverse of what it formerly 

 was. Experience has, in fact, demonstrated to the present generation 

 of sylviculturists, that generally a forest growth can be established 

 sooner^ more surely, and in better condition^ by planting ; sooner, because 

 it starts at least two years earlier than one that is sown, and, further- 

 more, four or five years often elapse before it is positively known whether 

 a sowing is to be repaired or completed, while in plantations the very 

 next year will show every plant that is unable to survive, and these 

 can be at once replaced: — more surely and in better condition, because 

 l)lautations are exposed to fewer casualties than seedling growths. The 

 success of the latter depends in the first instance, upon the quality of 

 the seeds. Now, as we are seldom so situated that we can harvest them 

 ourselves, we must take them as ofilered in the market, at which are too 

 often sold seeds gathered belbre they are ripe, or that are withered, or 

 badly kept, or heated, or too old. But assuming the most favorable 

 conditions, let us suppose that all the seeds we get are good, we still 

 have cause to fear tbat the soil is not well prepared, the sowing not 

 even, that the seed is covered too little or too much, or that too violent 

 showers or persistent drought, too burning a sun, or a late frost may 

 happen to destroy all our hopes ; but we will further suppose that the 

 season has been as favorable for the coming up of the seeds as we could 

 desire, and that the birds and the mice have scrupulously respected the 

 tender plants, we shall be very much deceived if we suppose that every- 

 thing is now secure ; but in fact, if the conditions have been propitious 

 for the growth of forest seeds, they have been equally so for the growth of 

 pernicious weeds ; so much so indeed, that we can scarcely find the 

 little germs in the midst of the grass and herbage by which they are 

 covered and stifled. We may sometimes pull up these weeds, but at the 

 risk of drawing up the young plants, but this does not always happen, 

 and in this case the mice often find among the dried weeds under the 

 snow, a refuge, the more attractive because it offers a shelter from the 

 colli, and young plants at hand for food. When the spring comes to 

 melt the snow, there is more sowing to be done, for everything is eaten 

 up. If we succeed in keeping a sowing clean of weeds the first year, 

 we have every reason to apprehend that in the next spring following 

 we shall find the ground spread over with young plants that have 

 been thrown out by the frost. Many other dangers await the seed- 

 ling forest during the following years, but it would be needless to 

 enumerate them. We have said enough to show that success in sowing 

 is uncertain. 



Plantations are likewise liable to late frosts, the teeth of mice, and of 

 various other accidents, but their existence is not endangered. In most 

 cases these troubles do not occur after two or three, or at most, four 

 years. The only real enemies to plantations are insects and their larvai, 

 and it is not surprising that foresters now give preference to this system. 



Plantations become dieaper than seeding. Experienced foresters do not 

 need facts to convince them upon this point. They know, in fact, that 

 if the cost of first establishment is a little less in sowing than in planting, 

 especially if seeds are cheap, the expenses occasioned in caring for the 

 work and of replanting gaps and vacant places is much greater for 



1 Messrs. Lorentz «fc Parade remark: "Sowing is considered by many foresters as 

 pri ncipally applicable to large operations because its processes are more natural and 

 simple, as well as cheaper than those of planting. But practice tends every day to 

 establish the superiority of the latter." {Cours Elementaire de Culture des Bois, 4th ed., 

 p. 509.) 



