BOOK III. CULTURE, &c. OF PLANTATIONS. 963 



6914. Improving neglected jjlantations. Though it has been more or less fashionable, 

 for upwards of a century, to form plantations ; yet it has been also so generally the 

 custom to neglect their future culture, that by far the greater proportion of the surface 

 covered with trees in Britain may be considered as neglected or mismanaged. The ar- 

 tificial strips and masses have generally never been thinned or pruned ; and the natural 

 woods and copse-woods improperly thinned, or cut over. It is often a difficult matter 

 to make much of such cases ; and always a work of considerable time. " Trees," Sang 

 observes, " however hardy their natures may be, which have been reared in a thick 

 plantation, and consequently have been very much sheltered, have their natures so far 

 changed, that if they be suddenly exposed to a circulation of air, which under different 

 circumstances, would have been salubrious and useful to them, will become sickly and 

 die. Hence the necessity of admitting the air to circulate freely among trees in a 

 thick plantation, only gradually and with great caution. To prevent a misfortune of 

 this kind, a plantation which has become close and crowded, having been neglected 

 from the time of planting till perhaps its twentieth year, should have only some of the 

 smallest and most unsightly plants removed : one perhaps, in every six or eight, in the 

 first season ; in the following season, a like number may be removed ; and in two or 

 three years after, it should be gone over again, and so on, till it be sufficiently thinned. 

 It will be proper to commence the thinning, as above, at the interior of the plantation, 

 leaving the skirts thicker till the last ; indeed, the thinning of the skirts of such a plant- 

 ation should be protracted to a great length of time." With thinning, pruning to a 

 certain extent should also be carried on. " If the plantation," Sang observes, " con- 

 sists of pines and firs, all the rotten stumps, decayed branches, and the like, must be cut 

 off close by the bole. It will be needful, however, to be cautious not to inflict too many 

 wounds upon the tree in one season ; the removing of these, therefore, should be the 

 work of two or three years, rather than endanger the health of the plantation. After 

 the removal of these from the boles of the firs and larches, proceed every two or three 

 years, but with a sparing hand, to displace one or perhaps two tiers of the lowermost 

 live branches, as circumstances may direct ; being careful to cut close by the trunk, as 

 above noticed. In a plantation of hard wood, under the above circumstances, the trees 

 left for the ultimate crop are not to be pruned so much at first as might otherwise be 

 required ; only one or two of their competing branches are to be taken away, and even 

 these with caution. If it be judged too much for the first operation to remove them en- 

 tirely, they may be shortened, to prevent the progress of the competition ; and the re- 

 maining parts may be removed in the following season ; at which time, as often observed, 

 they must be cut close by the bole." (Plant. Kal. 467.) 



6915. The operation of thinning and pruning, thickening or filling up, or renewing portions that cannot 

 be profitably recovered, should thus go on year after year, as appearances may direct, on the general 

 principles of tree culture. And for this purpose the attentive observation and reflection of a judicious 

 manager will be worth more than directions which must be given with so much latitude. Pontey has 

 noticed various errors in Kennedy's Treatise on Planting, and even in Sang's Kalendar, on the simple 

 subject of distances, which have originated in their giving directions for anticipated cases, which had 



never come within their experience. " Most people," he says, " take it for granted, that if trees stand 



three feet apart, they have only to take out the half, to make the di 



they must take down three times as many as they leave. By the sai 



suppose, that twelve feet distance was only the double of six ; but 



the square of the latter is only thirty-six, and that of the former one 



hundred and forty-four, or four times the latter ; so that to bring six 



feet distances to twelve, three trees must be removed for every one 



left." (Profitable Planter, 256. ; Forest Pruner, 21.) 



916. Copse-woods are sometimes improved by turning them into 



6916. 



woods, which requires nothing more than a judicious selection and 

 reservation of those shoots from the stools which are strongest, and 

 which spring more immediately from the collar. But a greater im- 

 provement of copse-woods consists in cutting over the overgrown and 

 protuberant stools, by the surface of the soil (fig. 660. a, b, c, d], which 

 has been found by Monteath completely to regenerate them. The 

 operation is performed with a saw, in a slanting direction, and the 

 young shoots being afterwards properly thinned and pruned, soon 

 establish themselves securely on the circumference of large, and per- 

 haps, rotten-hearted roots. (Forester's Guide, 60.) 



6917. Hedge-rows are often neglected, and, like larger plantations, require renovation 

 by cutting down and filling in vacancies, and by cultivating the soil at their roots. 

 Hedges, Sang observes, which have been- long neglected, shoot up to a great height 

 like trees, become naked at bottom, and occupy too much ground, at least for lands in 

 a state of high cultivation. The best .method of reducing such to a proper size, and of 

 forming them into an immediate fence, is by plashing. 



6918. Plashing. This consists in selecting the strongest and straightest shoots. 

 These are to be dressed up and headed down to four feet, and in such a way that the 

 tops of the whole may range in a neat line. These are called the stakes ; and, when 

 they are deficient, either in strength or number, recourse must be had to artificial stakes, 

 which must be driven in to stand firm, and supply the deficiency of natural ones. 

 Having proceeded thus far in preparing the hedge for plashing, the Ledger is to begin 



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