32 ELEMENTS OF SYLVICULTURE. 



waiting for the natural re-stocking of these spots, 

 because the soil must necessarily have deteriorated 

 under the exposure, and will be no longer in a fit 

 state to receive seed. 



But although the young plants can henceforth do 

 without shelter, it may be advantageous to leave a 

 certain number of reserves standing, either to let 

 them attain exceptionally large dimensions, or 

 because they have not yet reached their most useful 

 size. This is especially the case with the oak, for 

 large pieces of which there is such a great demand, 

 while their supply is diminishing every day. 



The trees thus preserved must be carefully cleaned 

 of all their epicormic branches.* It is because this 

 has not been done that many oaks, left as reserves, 

 have become stag-headed and have had to be cut 

 down prematurely. This has led some people to 

 think it impossible to preserve them, in spite of the 

 incontestable proof to the contrary offered by old 

 reserves w T hich are scattered about in existing high 

 forests. They evidently had to pass through the 

 same ordeal of isolation which will in our case be 

 lessened in intensity and shortened in duration to a 

 remarkable degree by seasonable pruning. 



We should never be in too much of a hurry to 

 make the final cutting, because in the first place, the 

 shelter afforded by reserves left standing here and 

 there is the only sure means of protecting the young 

 plants from the effects of late spring frosts in 

 exposed localities; secondly, because until the 



* The side branches which develop on the bole as soon as the 

 tree is isolated ; from I TH, on, and Kop/ut, stem of a tree. 



