1 84 DECIDUOUS TREES 



A few Americans will plant catalpa, locust, or some other tree crop 

 that matures in seven to fifteen years, but when the passion for endur- 

 ing things becomes a national trait with us we will plant oaks and 

 other species that require a hundred years or more to mature. Mean- 

 while, the Bureau of Forestry at Washington, D. C., has a plan for 

 cooperating with any one who has a forest in which profit is the chief 

 consideration. 



THE LANDSCAPE FORESTRY EFFECT 



By "landscape forestry" I mean the art of managing woods for 

 pleasure. There are thousands upon thousands of private deer 

 parks and game preserves in England, while here they are com- 

 paratively rare. One can always tell a park by the abundance of 

 grass and the peculiar shape of the trees. Most of these are nicely 

 rounded, and all have a flat base at a uniform height above the 

 ground the height to which deer and cattle can reach. It would 

 be childish in us to imitate this effect. If one keeps cattle for 

 breeding purposes the effect will come naturally and will be appro- 

 priate. But if one wants a park for beauty it is much better to 

 have the branches of specimen trees come right down to the ground. 



In sporting woods, the characteristic effect is a dense under- 

 growth of English laurel (Prunus Laurocerasus), a broad-leaved 

 evergreen shrub of great beauty which is not hardy here. We can 

 never duplicate this effect, but even if our rhododendrons are 

 narrower, darker, and duller of leaf, the fact is of small consequence. 

 When America is as crowded as England we shall doubtless pay 

 much attention to breeding cattle and making game preserves 

 but it would be the shallowest sort of affectation for us to imitate 

 now her cattle-pruned trees or laurel coverts. 



The private arboretum is occasionally seen in England. Its 

 object is to cultivate every kind of hardy tree. Some examples 



