CHAPTER XL 



FORESTS OF TREES OF VARIOUS AGES 

 (MITTELWALD). 



THE German Mittelmald, or mixed forest of timber 

 and coppice, will be best understood by regarding 

 it as an old coppice in which a few stems per acre 

 have been spared at every cutting, until, in process 

 of time, it contains trees of all ages, from timber to 

 coppice shoots and seedlings ; and at every coppice 

 clearing a few selected stems being left, a corre- 

 sponding number of older trees are taken out. 



The theory of this system is a very pretty one. 

 It rests upon the assumption that a dozen or 

 twenty trees to the acre, left at the first cutting, 

 would neither perceptibly affect the yield of 

 coppice, nor would they shade the ground so as 

 appreciably to affect the yield at the second cut- 

 ting, while it is understood that the trees make 

 more wood in the later than in the first stages, 

 and are also growing to a better class of wood. 

 Practically the system is not so satisfactory. 



