182 ELEMENTS OF SYLVICULTUKE. 



very numerous. Moreover, many must decay pre- 

 maturely, and the seedlings as a whole will have 

 little to fear from their reservation. 



But there is another point to which it is proper to 

 call the reader's attention. Those oak trees, which 

 have grown in a state of isolation, and which, as they 

 were to be preserved, were not pruned in the primary 

 cutting, will have holes twenty to thirty feet long at 

 the utmost. When the young crop is high enough 

 to fill up the gaps between their crowns, and to form 

 with them an unbroken leaf-canopy, the lower 

 branches of these latter trees will necessarily die, 

 and hence it may be feared that diseases and faults 

 in the wood will be the consequence, But a little 

 reflection will soon show that this danger is more 

 imaginary than real. In the first place, so far as 

 third class standards are concerned, it will generally 

 be right to fell them at the moment this happens, for 

 a considerable number of years will have elapsed 

 since their preservation in the first regeneration cut- 

 ting ; and as for the second class standards it must 

 not be forgotten that if they belong to a block where 

 cuttings preparatory to regeneration have been made 

 they will have lived in complete leaf-canopy during a 

 space of sixty or seventy years. At the moment 

 they are isolated, they will naturally possess boles 

 long enough to have nothing to fear from being 

 pressed round on every side by the new growth. 

 The difficulty presents itself only when the regenera- 

 tion of the first block is undertaken immediately, and 

 never occurs afterwards. 



It will lie with the executive officer to appreciate 



