194 Transactions.— Miscellaneous. 
If there be a good seed year and sufficient rain the ground should be 
thickly covered with seedlings within two or three years of the first clearing, 
nature being assisted when necessary by hand sowing, transplanting from 
patches where the seedlings have come up very quickly, to the barer spots, 
and other measures of forest craft. When the ground is pretty well covered 
the old trees are felled and carefully removed, so as to do as little damage 
as possible to the new crop, and the block recommences life, so to speak, 
nothing further being done until the first thinning. The above is briefly 
the whole process of natural reproduction, which is the simplest and most 
economical of all systems, and especially applicable to forests of deciduous 
trees. 
The period between the first or preparatory clearing to the final clearing 
varies from ten to thirty years, the more gradual and protracted method 
being now most in favour, particularly in the Black Forest, where the old 
trees are removed so gradually that there can scarcely be said to be any 
clearing at all, the new crop being well advanced before the last of the 
parent trees is removed. This approximates to “felling by selection," 
which is the primitive system of working forests in all countries, under 
which in its ruder form the forester proceeds without method, selecting such 
timber as suits him, irrespective of its relation to the forest increment. 
Reduced to system, it has certain advantages, especially in mountain forests, 
in which, if the steep slopes be laid bare, area by area, avalanches, land- 
slips and disastrous torrents might result, but the annual output under 
this system is never more than two-thirds of that obtained by the rotation 
system, and there are other objections which it is unnecessary to detail in 
this paper, which have caused it to be rightly condemned, and now-a-days 
only retained in the treatment of European forests under peculiar or special 
circumstances. 
I now turn to the important subject of “ artificial reproduction,” or the 
raising of crops of timber by artificial sowing or planting. Itis not within 
the scope of this paper to describe the various methods of sowing and 
planting, or to pronounce any opinion as to which are the best, or the most 
suitable for New Zealand. The special necessities and requirements of each 
case must always becarefully considered before planting operations are com- 
menced, and with a climate and conditions so varied as they are in this Colony, 
it would be absurd and misleading to attempt to generalise on this point. 
The situation, soil, rainfall, purpose and species, should all have careful 
consideration before any money is spent, even in the formation of a nursery. 
Having decided what to sow or plant, and how to do it, let me strongly 
recommend its being done well, with great care, and without stint of money 
at the commencement. Liberality, or even what may seem extravagance 
