APPLICATION OF THE SELECTION METHOD. 105 



one of them. Next year the same is done in another 

 circle, and a rotation of the various circles is so 

 arranged that the same point is revisited every 

 four or five years. The neighbouring portions of the 

 forest are relied upon to refill the area cut with seed. 

 This method may answer when the cutting coincides 

 with a year of seed. But under the climates and in 

 the damp soils that suit the spruce fir, the ground 

 becomes rapidly overgrown with numerous weeds, 

 and it is often a long time before a seedling crop 

 appears, unless recourse is had to artificial re- 

 stocking. 



HARDY CONIFERS. When the forest is stocked 

 with larch, the Scotch or the Corsican pines, seed- 

 lings will not be produced, and above all will not 

 prosper, unless they receive plenty of light. The 

 gaps made for the spruce fir will be no longer 

 sufficiently large. Hence the selection fellings must 

 be still further concentrated, and eight to ten trees 

 must be removed from the sa-me spot, so as to create 

 small blanks of about 400 square yards ; it will be 

 advisable to slightly loosen the soil over these small 

 blanks, in order that reproduction may be better 

 ensured. Only they must not be made too near to- 

 gether, otherwise the forest would become a 

 complete chess-board, and the wind might get in and 

 prove mischievous. Whenever it is possible, it 

 would be an advantage to split up the forest into 

 several groups, to operate in each successively, and 

 as its turn comes round, so to locate the fellings that 

 they may succeed each other in the order of their 

 respective dates. 



