1 36 PRACTICAL FORESTRY. 



stage or at maturity. To plant trees which will in due 

 course prove useless is to be deprecated. For example : 

 Lime, horse-chestnut, spruce fir, and the like will find few 

 purchasers, even if the trees be sound and well grown, 

 whereas larch, Scotch pine, oak, beech, ash, and the like 

 will be saleable at all stages of growth and when matured. 



The selection, bearing this principle in mind, must accord 

 with the character of the soil, site, and degree of moisture. 

 For example : On dry soils of good quality, clays, loams, 

 and marls, trees of magnitude may be chosen, such as oak, 

 beech, ash, elm, and in combination with them larch, fir, 

 and Scotch pine. On drained but cold-bottomed lands, 

 poplar, alder, sycamore ; and, if not subject to periodical 

 excess of moisture, ash, wych elm, and Scotch pine. On 

 sand and gravel soils, sweet chestnut, sycamore, Corsican 

 and Scotch pines. Then, on any reasonably dry land, of a 

 calcareous nature, beech and larch ; and so on. 



Pure or Mixed Planting. 



The question will next arise : Shall the trees be planted 

 pure or mixed? We believe the best commercial returns 

 will be secured by pure planting, because the growth is 

 more uniform and control more effective. Therefore on 

 subsoil suitable to larch, and where disease is not likely to 

 be destructive, pure planting is to be highly commended ; 

 in fact, there are few more profitable forms of afforestation 

 equal to this. The crop can be reaped at the pole stage, 

 say in thirty or forty years, and the site replanted, or allowed 

 to mature, say in forty to eighty years. Which will pay 

 best must be a matter of opinion and calculation, and 

 according to local conditions. For profit we are inclined 

 to the former; but at the same time larch timber of full 

 magnitude will sell at a high price per cubic foot. A full 

 crop of matured larch reach.es as nearly as can be the a< me 



