96 PRACTICAL TREE REPAIR 



of limited and local infection by a fungus which 

 produces a definite line of demarcation between the 

 sound wood and the diseased. At other times 

 it is absolutely impossible of attainment, and is fre- 

 quently impossible at a reasonable cost. The 

 second intention is subject to about the same 

 chances of success, depending upon the kind of 

 tree and the shape and location of the incision. 

 As regards the third purpose, it may be said that 

 fillings add little or nothing, of themselves, to the 

 strength of the tree. The iron braces usually put 

 in to hold the filling in place, however, have some 

 strengthening effect. But this phase of the work 

 will be taken up in greater detail in the following 

 chapter. 



These are the things that the tree surgeons do, 

 but they are not, it is true, the only things they 

 claim to do. They have been able to create in 

 people's minds the impression that filling a tree 

 constitutes an immediate relief from some sort of 

 canker which saps the life of the tree, and that the 

 process of filling exerts a direct physiological in- 

 fluence, at once increasing the tree's vigor and re- 

 storing, so to speak, its good spirits. This kind 

 of talk has caused the breach which undoubtedly 

 exists (and much to the detriment of the real 

 science of tree repair) between the tree surgeons 

 and the arboriculturists and landscape architects. 



A gentleman whose knowledge of plant physi- 



