106 CUIEOARTOUSNESS AND SOCIABILITY OF SPECIES. 



dense invasive root-system, with regard to the degree in which the 

 surface or subsoil rock is fissured, and with regard to the freedom 

 of the drainage. Where the soil is too binding or not sufficiently 

 drained or too dry for teak, or the rock is too compact, or the 

 growth of weeds, especially the grasses, is too heavy and dense, that 

 species will be entirely, or very largely, kept out, notwithstanding 

 that numerous seedlings of it may germinate in such places. 



(b) Where the teak grows, it is almost the only tree cut for 

 timber, furnishing, as it does, everything from the large house 

 beam and broad boards to the thin round rafter qf the rude tem- 

 porary thatched shed. 



(c) The yearling teak seedling can, as a rule, survive only on 

 the condition that the taproot, which for many years forms the 

 most sensitive and vital portion of the plant, is able to expand and 

 f-trengthen itself at once. Hence the death of nearly all or by far 

 the largest proportion of the seedlings produced each year, except 

 where the soil is especially favourable. 



(d) A great many of the companions of teak are more shade^ 

 enduring than itself. 



(e) In the condition in which the soil of a forest is ordinarily 

 found, most of its companions establish themselves earlier, and 

 thus take possession of the soil while young teak of their own age 

 are still comparatively weak plants. 



(f) In many places several of its companions exceed the teak 

 in stature. 



(g) Many of these species possess broader and deeper crowns, 

 (h) Many of them also retain their foliage till a later date, and 



some of them even bring out the new season's flush earlier. 



(?) After a certain age teak loses the faculty of forming a com- 

 plete leaf-.canopy by itself, thus necessarily giving admission to, 

 other species even where it originally formed a pure crop. 



(j) Its seed, being large, does not find easy lodgement in the 

 soil, unless this is loose or broken at the surface; and, being also round, 

 is exposed to be washed away by the first heavy showers, especially 

 where forest fires occur and leave no standing Yegetatipn to pro- 

 ject above the ground and arrest the seed. 



(&) Again, as the teak seed is all shed by the middle of the hot 

 weather, the greater portion of it must every year have been des- 

 troyed by the annual forest fires b.efore special protective measures, 

 of very recent date, began to be undertaken, and is still so destroyed 

 over the vast areas where fire conservancy is either unsuccessful 

 or has yet to be introduced. 



