64 ENGLISH WOODLANDS 



Another advantage of alder is that they repro- 

 duce themselves freely. 



Beech, by the custom of the county, is timber 

 in Buckinghamshire. The large beech woods 

 grown on the chalk hills supply the timber for 

 the kitchen chairs and furniture which are 

 made at High Wycombe and the villages near 

 the woods. These woods are managed on the 

 following system : Each wood is visited every 

 eight or sixteen years, or some other regular 

 time. All the mature trees are then felled and 

 the other trees thinned. Every portion of the 

 wood has on it trees of every age in regular 

 gradation, and the cutting is managed so that 

 as an age class grows older its numbers become 

 less. The grandfathers of the wood are cut out 

 to make way for the fathers who, in their turn, 

 become grandfathers. The trees are very largely 

 self-sown. Sixty to eighty years are the periods 

 of growth. These woods can, under careful 

 management, produce a regular income of l 

 to 80s. per acre. 



Outside Buckinghamshire there are few woods 

 of pure beech, and the prices for beech timber 

 were prior to the war generally unremunerative. 

 The merit of the beech, from a planter's point 

 of view, is that it will grow in the shade of other 



