THINNING OF PLANTATIONS. 99 



have adopted it, and I have seen with surprise and pleasure their workmen trimming 

 close to the trunk in the State forest of Pourlans, adjacent to my trimmings of Clux. 

 In the Cote-d'Or the forest administration imposes on contractors for cutting wood to 

 supply the communes, the duty of trimining close, and 1 have many times lent them 

 tools and coal-tar for this use. I will add that the administration appears to me (and 

 properly) convinced of the importance of a very rigid supervision, as it has decided 

 that trimming out of sight of a guard shall be deemed a trespass. Ttiis is an excellent 

 measure, as it throws the responsibility upon the guard, and compels in him au active 

 surveillance. I am far from affirming that this practice has become general through- 

 out the Cote-d'Or, but it is iu force in the communal woods adjoining the forest of 

 Bagny. The administration of Fonts et chauss^es has used since 1869 the practice of close 

 trimming npou trees planted along certain departmental roads, by practicing the method 

 of M. des Cars and covering the wounds with coal-tar, and they are to be complimented 

 for the fine result of these plantations. 



The conclusion that I draw from the above is, that the objections brought against the 

 method are not well founded. They apply only to the exceptions, to operations badly or 

 unskillfully done, and, reasoning from probabilities based upon these inductions, they 

 huild a fragile scaffolding of suppositions more or less judicious, but without assert- 

 ing any statement which the experience of actual results does not prove to be false. 



The system of trimming of the Count des Cars, which its opponents themselves ad- 

 mit to be logical, has no need of defenders; it will defend itself by its own results. 

 But it is needful that these acquired results should be made known, and this duty is 

 incumhent upon those who first entered upon the career, and it is to this end that I 

 have brought together these observations that I now submit. 



THINNING OF PLANTATIONS. 



In a young growth of natural seedlings, the plants are often densely- 

 crowded ; but as they become larger the feeble ones die, acd others lose 

 their lower branches; and so, from year to year, the numbers diminish 

 in the struggle for life, until but a small part of the first number comes 

 to full maturity. The careful forester seek^ to imitate this process of 

 nature, by securing a sufficient growth for shading the ground from au 

 early period, and by reducing the numbers as the trees increase in size. 

 These labors include the clearing out of the worthless bushes and 

 brambles that never come to useful size, but is chiefly secured by giving 

 the greatest opportunity possible to the most valuable kinds. Xo rales 

 can be given for the execution of this work, without knowing the con- 

 ditions, further than the general statement, that it should be done where- 

 ever required, and as often as may be necessary. 



With respect to the removal of a part of the trees of the valuable 

 kinds, where crowded, great prudence is to be exercised, because the 

 whole growth, if standing dense, if too much exposed at once, would be 

 liable to suffer from the winds, or from the weight of suows. The precept 

 laid down by Lorentz and Parade for the first thinniug is as follows :^ 



The principal rule to be observed in a thinning of this kind is to keep the trees con- 

 veniently close, and, in a wrod, never interrupt the continuity. In a young wood, which 

 has hitherto grown very dense, the stems are very thin and slender, and have the 

 greatest need of support. An imprudent clearing would expose them to storms ; they 

 would be injured by the weight of snow and ice, or even bent down by the weight of 

 their own tops. In such a growth, it is to some extent necessary to save some of the 

 poorer kind as protectors, and allow them to stand till the next thinning. We should 

 also remember that the young trees must obtain the greatest height possible, and this 

 can only be done by keeping them close. At an older stage of growth, the inconven- 

 ience of too much thinning would bo less injurious. Moreover, if opened too much, 

 the grass and weeds will get in and absorb a part of the aliment of the soil ; or, if it be a 

 seed year, a new crop of tree seedlings will cover the ground, which is to be. If pos- 

 sible, avoided. 



The age at which the first thinning is needed cannot be fixed by any rule, as it de- 

 pends upon the rate of growth and the various influences to which it is exposed. It 

 should begin as soon as the lower branches begin to die and drop off, and should be 

 repeated more thoroughly when the trees get to be three or four inches in diameter at 



1 Culture des Bois, 2d ed., p. 174. 



