255 



The capacity for increase, explained here by means of the one example, 

 has a greater significance in moor regions, where the spruce will have to be 

 grown as the only possible means of forestration. 



Only very few varieties of conifers possess this facility for forming 

 layers and developing new regular top growth from lateral sprouts. Gar- 

 deners make abundant use of this peculiarity in propagating young individ- 

 uals from cuttings. In other conifers, cuttings from the lateral branches 

 retain the structure of laterals and do not form handsome trunks. The 





^^rQ. 



'*®ft^'-i,-r/j»' 



Fig. 34. Oak from Rogau (Upper Silesia) with a formation of sinlvers. (Orig.) 



genus Araucaria also has a great tendency to form head shoots and this is 

 often shown in individual lateral branches, which remain on the parent 

 plant, when the top shoot has been lost. 



In connection with this layering formation of the spruce, occurring on 

 damp soils, we give in figure 34 the sketch of a case of root formation from 

 a branch of an oak, which has been observed only once. In the 8o's of the 

 last century, I had an opportunity in the castle park at Rogau (Upper 

 Silesia) of seeing the very hollow trunk of an old oak which stood on a low 

 lying meadow, liable to be overflowed by the Oder at flood time. The tree 



