434 Lord Glenbervie on the devastatiotis of 



In the autamn of 1810, Haywood inclosure was first completed 

 so as to exclude all the commonable cattle, and the few Deer still 

 remaining in that forest, and was then planted with acorns. In 

 the spring following, plants from about one third of those acorns 

 came up, the remainder it is probable were destroyed principally 

 by Mice. The natural hollies which it had been necessary to cut 

 down in order to give room for planting the acorns, had made 

 young shoots, but no attack was made upon them in the winter of 

 1811. The runs of the Mice however appeared very numerous. 

 In the autumn of 1812, a large quantity of five years old oaks and 

 chesnuts, with some other forest trees, as ash, larch, and fir, were 

 planted at regular distances in the same inclosure. In the winter 

 of that year, the first symptoms of the devastation by the barking 

 of the plants were perceived by the woodman in the shoots of the 

 hollies that were now got to the height of two, three, or more feet, 

 great numbers of them being barked round at the ground for four 

 or five inches upwards, and in consequence dead or dying. This 

 soon became almost universal over the whole of that inclosure. 

 In the spring following (1813) a number of five years old oaks and 

 chesnuts were found dead, and on being pulled up, it appeared 

 that the roots had been gnawed through two or three inches below 

 the surface ; many were also barked round and killed in the same 

 manner as the holly shoots, and a great number begun upon, and 

 consequently become sickly, though not as yet entirely killed. 

 The evil was observed about the same time to have extended itself 

 to some of the other inclosures. 



The first notice / received of this misfortune was by a letter 

 from the Deputy Surveyor of Dean Forest to our Secretary in the 

 Department of Woods, dated 14th May, 1813, and I cannot give 

 a more lively impression of the serious alarm excited by the evil, 

 than by transcribing the words of that letter. 



" I am very much alarmed at the danger likely to arise to the 

 plantations from the Field Mice, particularly in Haywood and 

 Crabtree Hill Inclosures. The woodmen in both have found five 

 years old oak and chesnut plants, in various places barked round 

 at the bottom, and consequently dead ; but their principal de- 

 vastation at present is confined to the young shoots from the 



