CULTIVATION OP COPPICES. 103 



The forests of Morvan consist of about one-half beech, one-fifth oak, 

 one-fifth hornbeam, and the remainder of " white woods." ^ Particular 

 care is taken at each cutting, to leave the stool a little shorter than it 

 was before, so as to take all of the new wood. This is especially impor- 

 tant with the beech, which, under this treatment, will give a fine vigor- 

 ous growth through two or three periods of revolution. Its highest 

 vigor of reproduction by shoots is at about twenty-five or thirty years 

 of age; but when the stumps become large, they are apt to become 

 hollow and the vital power feeble. 



It is always desirable to have the young trees secure some independ- 

 ent roots, as may happen when the cutting is done close to the ground. 



A Scotch writer remarks that the oak coppice after growing two sea- 

 sous should have the shoots around the edge of the crown or stump 

 thinned, leaving six or eight on each, preference being given to those 

 growing from near the ground, and that will send down some roots of 

 their own. 



TLe second thinning may be done in about six years, and the shoots 

 reduced to two or three to a stump. The shoots cut at these thinnings 

 are sold in bundles of 100, trimmed to the point, for crates and hampers, 

 and those of the beech for brooms. 



A third thinning and trimming is had two years before final cut- 

 ting, the vigorous growth thus given tending largely to increase the 

 amount of tannin in the bark, while trees in this condition peel more 

 easily. 



When a stock has become decayed, or from careless cutting so high 

 that shoots cannot spring up to advantage, it should be cut down level 

 with the ground, when the roots will send up new and vigorous shoots, 

 which will get rooted on their own account. 



When oaks are planted in Scotland for coppice, they are generally set 

 8 feet ai)art and the intervening spaces filled up to 3 feet apart with 

 larches. The latter should be progressively removed during the first 

 15 years' growth, and the oaks encouraged to grow in a stout branchy 

 habit, so that they will at 20 years have stumps 6 or 8 inches through 

 When properly managed, the sale of crate-wood and other thinnings 

 will in that country pay all expenses of management. 



" Sartage." — In some European countries, upon cutting off a growth 

 of coppice timber, the brush are strown evenly over the ground or piled 

 on the old stumps too large to send up shoots with profit, and the whole 

 field is burned over with fire ; a sufficient guard being stationed to pre- 

 vent the fires from spreading. The ashes are found to fertilize the 

 ground and the heat is not enough to injure the roots. A crop or two 

 is cultivated, usually buckwheat or rye, which must be reaped by hand, 

 so as not to injure the young shoots which presently sjmng up and 

 shade out everything but themselves. This process, which the French 

 call sartage (wrecking), is chiefly followed in the Ardennes, and near 

 Liege, Luxemborg, and the south of Germany, and succeeds best with 

 oak coppice, cut off every 20 years for tan-bark and fire- wood. It is 

 there followed by a greater aggregate of wood-growth in a given period. 

 It cannot be practiced in all places, being best where the soil is a deep, 

 strong clay, that is liable to retain much moisture. It is sometimes 

 done by " covered fire;" that is, the soil is peeled with a hoe, including the 

 herbage, sod, and mosses, which are piled and burned, and their ashes 

 scattered over the soil. Tliese fires will smolder many days, and, of 

 course, fill the air far and near with a noisome odor. 



^ This term is applied to -willowa, poplars, alders, and lindens, to distinguish them 

 from hard woods. 



