THE CULTURE OF CONIFERS 31 



Clover give very good results. The decayed vegetable matter 

 keeps the soil from packing and furnislies plenty of food for the 

 young seedlings. 



It is a good plan, in fact it is very necessary, that the area set 

 aside for planting of the seed bed, be given thorough cultivation 

 for at least one, or better, two years, before the sowing of the seeds 

 takes place. Soil handled in this manner will be practically free 

 from weed seeds, and this is a point of real importance in the pro- 

 duction of conifers from seed; it is impossible to produce sturdy 

 young seedlings and a crop of weeds on the same area. It is also a 

 great deal cheaper to remove the weeds with a harrow and a two- 

 horse team, a year or two in advance of planting, when you com- 

 pare this cost with the expense of having the seed beds weeded 

 clean by hand after the young seedlings have started to grow. Of 

 course, there will be much hand-weeding necessary even when the 

 soil has been given clean culti^'ation for the entire two years before 

 planting. And right here I might add that it is mighty important 

 in keeping the tender young seedlings free from weeds, that the 

 work is begun just as soon as the little seedlings appear above the 

 ground. Do not let the weeds get a start. Weeding, of course, 

 is only a detail, but is an important detail, and I have come to the 

 conclusion throughout my experience in producing conifers from 

 seed, that it is only by giving the strictest attention to these seem- 

 ingly unimportant details that we get the maximum results. It 

 is seldom any one great calamity happens; it is usually a lack of 

 attention to a number of small details that causes failure. 



The Size of the Seed Bed. The seed beds in most of the nurseries 

 throughout Europe are three and a half feet wide by sixty-five 

 feet long. I have never been able to find out why this size was 

 uniformly adopted by the growers of Europe. I infer, therefore, 

 that the size of the seed bed is of minor importance. However, 

 it is necessary that you have a standard size for all beds to facili- 

 tate the keeping of the necessary production records. I have 

 therefore based my operations upon a standard bed four feet wide 

 and one hundred seventy-six feet long. The four-foot width is 

 made necessary from the fact that the standard lath used for mak- 

 ing the rack shades comes in four-foot lengths. The length of the 

 bed was determined from the fact that part of the labor, which is 



