america:n sylviculture 



Plantations are frequently found and do very well in early 

 youth, unless the soil is badly hardened and impoverished. The 

 stands should be dense, whether pure or mixed with Oaks etc., 

 so as to produce clean boles. Plantations seem to fail in the 

 close proximity of old trees. 



The plantations at Biltmore have failed invariably in the 

 woods, owing to the ravages of squirrels; toungya on leased farms 

 shows poor success, owing to the unreliability of the lessees; 

 plantations of seedlings three years old failed badly; plantations 

 of yearlings freeze to the ground annually on all slopes; plantations 

 of nuts on small fields have done very well, where the ground was 

 good; and the change from good to bad, brought about by the 

 undulations of the soil, is very marked. Failures on poor soil are 

 now doctored up by a nursegrowth of Yellow Pines, — a remedy 

 promising some success. 



E. Beech: 



I. The primeval forest exhibits tlie compartment, group and 

 selection type of n. s. r. The humus is usually very heavy and so 

 moist that fires have a poor chance to spread. In the South, at 

 lower altitudes, Beech merely fringes the river banks. 



II. The culled seed forest shows many root suckers (Appala- 

 chians) and stump sprouts, stumps three feet higli forming the 

 sprouts on the top of the stump. 



In the Blue Grass Region, huge park trees are frequently found 

 in a dense undergrowth of seedlings and saplings. Here the more 

 valuable species have been culled out many years ago, and the Beech 

 is left in exclusive possession of the soil. 



III. The cultured seed forests of Beech are easily regenerated 

 in the shelterwood-compartment type. The selection type yields 

 branchy boles. Beech is the best companion imaginable for faster- 

 growing species; is splendidly qualified for an underwood planted 

 beneath aristocratic species; is exacting and sensitive. 



Plantations on abandoned fields are out of the question, except 

 at high altitudes. 



In Michigan, the fall of 1911 produced a full mast of beechnuts. 



F. Bass wood; 



I. Primeval forests: 



In the Lake States and in the -.-illeghanies, Basswood exhibits 

 the form emanating from the selection type of n. s. r., grafted 

 on the compartment type of White Pine, or of Hard Maple, or 



1G8 



