APPENDIX. liii 



It would have been better to incorporate these essential 

 provisos into the main rules and not lay down that all trees other 

 than the dominant trees should be removed. Again in his defini- 

 tion of crown thinning it is prescribed that dead trees and part 

 of the dominant trees will be removed but that the dominated 

 and suppressed trees will be left to shelter the soil. It is con- 

 tended that a correct thinning by which is intended a compromise 

 between ' eclairde par le haut * and ordinary grade C thinning will 

 involve 



(1) the regularising of the canopy by thinnings among the 



best dominant trees ; 



(2) the removal of badly shaped dominant trees in favour of 



well grown dominated trees ; 



(3) the thinning out of the dominant trees in favour of the 



dominant trees or alternatively for the benefit of other 

 dominated trees retained as part of the crop. 



The removal of suppressed trees is a matter of expediency 

 depending largely on local markets for the produce. Wherever 

 possible they may be cut, and in coniferous forest their retention 

 is undesirable but, as already noted, under certain circumstances 

 in the case of sal they are better kept, to shelter the ground. 



Trees top-broken by snow have a great power of recovery and 

 should not be removed merely because they have lost their leader. 

 Unless broken in half or otherwise irretrievably damaged they 

 should only be removed under the ordinary rules for thinnings. 



The question of the correct manner of executing thinnings 

 has been studied for many .years, and after carrying out this 

 operation over many thousand acres and seeing the deplorable 

 results of a neglect of this most important work, the writer is in 

 entire agreement with the words of the eminent authorities already 

 quoted : opinions which may be aptly summed up in the words 

 of Cannon : 



' The health, the life of the crop lies in judicious reiterated 

 thinnings." 



" TBOWSGOED." 

 18 



