﻿WHITE PINE UNDER FOREST MANAGEMENT. 57 



rye. One crop of rye was reaped and the land then abandoned to 

 the pine. 



While the initial expense of sowing may sometimes be less than 

 that of planting, it is often greater, and the stand, even if moderately 

 successful, will usually contain openings which must be planted up 

 if a fully stocked stand is desired. In the long run the sowed stand 

 may prove considerably more costly and at the same time inferior to 

 the planted one. Sowing, however, is a relatively easy method of 

 reproduction, and is the only way in which very large areas can be 

 economically covered in a single season. 



There are three methods of sowing seed direct: (1) broadcasting 

 over the whole area, (2) sowing in strips, and (3) sowing in seed spots. 



Broadcast Sowing. 



Ordinarily, broadcast sowing offers little chance of success, except 

 when the ground has been cultivated or burned over, or the seed 

 raked in after sowing, for not only must there be a sufficient amount 

 of moisture for germination, but the seedling must quickly get its 

 rootlets into mineral soil. It is best to sow broadcast except where 

 conditions are especially favorable, as when there is a very light 

 ground cover partially exposing the mineral soil. Conditions such 

 as these may be found on burned-over areas coming up to aspen, 

 from which fire has removed part of the grass and litter, and shade 

 is afforded the pine seedlings in early youth by the aspen trees. 

 Ground covered with leaves of broadleaf trees is not a suitable site 

 for broadcasting, since the leaves either prevent the seed from reach- 

 ing the soil or smother the seedlings after they germinate. Sloping 

 ground, where there is usually the least litter, with a north or east 

 aspect, ordinarily offers the best site for broadcasting. It is on 

 recently cultivated land, however, that broadcast sowing has been 

 most successful. Here also the sowing can be combined cheaply 

 with crop raising. 



Until white-pine seed becomes cheaper, however, broadcast sowing 

 is hardly justified from a financial standpoint. Five pounds of seed 

 are necessary to broadcast an acre. With the price of seed at $2.25 

 per pound (cheaper at wholesale), the initial cost of sowing an acre 

 will be $11.25. Results obtained in actual practice vary from total 

 failure to a stand of several thousand seedlings per acre. Success 

 depends chiefly upon whether the ground is properly prepared. A 

 pound of seed sown in a nursery bed will produce from 10,000 to 

 15,000 seedlings, and the expense of producing and planting on an 

 acre 1,210 two-year-old seedlings (6 by 6 spacing) will cost from $7 

 to $15, with a reasonable assurance of 80 per cent survival. 



