APPLICATION OF COPPICE WITH STANDAKDS. 169 



no obstacle to the maintenance of seedlings, and, in ad- 

 dition to this, will furnish produce of a special value. 



The next operation which demands the utmost 

 care is the actual cutting. All the stools must be 

 cut down close to the ground, and particular atten- 

 tion must be paid that every existing natural and 

 artificial oak seedling is cut back. 



When the new crop is three, four, or five years 

 old, according to the rapidity of growth, the time 

 has come for making the first cleaning. This 

 operation must be repeated at stated intervals up to 

 the age of twenty years. Its object is not to liber- 

 ate all the seedlings. It is seldom that these can 

 be selected as standards at the next felling, but they 

 can be kept in a sufficiently healthy state, that when 

 cut back they may produce shoots fit to be reserved 

 at the subsequent fellings. 



According to the length of the rotation, the under- 

 wood should be thinned once or twice. This opera- 

 tion must continue the work of setting free the 

 seedlings and effecting the germination of others. 

 As the necessity arises, this end must be accelerated 

 by putting out a few transplants five or six years 

 before the coppice is cut. 



It is obvious that without carrying out pruning to 

 extreme lengths, the lower branches of first class 

 standards may be lopped off, and epicormic branches 

 carefully got rid of. If possible this latter operation 

 should be executed the very year these branches 

 make their appearance : the prompter the remedy, 

 the more certain will be the result, and the smaller 

 the cost. 



