348 



Garden and Forest. 



[Number 286. 



Orchids, its odd-shaped flowers are interesting, and the whole 

 plant is attractive in appearance. From solid bulbs of half to 

 three-quarters of an inch in diameter it sends up two rather 

 large ovate leaves and a loose spike of twenty to forty or more 

 flowers, growing- six to eight inches high. The flowers have 

 three linear sepals, one of which points backward, looking very 

 much like a spur, the other two, diverging a little, are placed 

 close under and project in the form of a short point beyond 

 the lip, which is wedge-obovate and abruptly short-pointed and 

 half an inch long. Two thread-like petals, about half an inch 

 long, are turned downward, curving toward each other at the 

 lower end. The calyx is greenish white, the lip and petals 

 brown-purple, and the pedicels dark purple. Two years ago 

 I collected several plants while they were in flower, and last 

 year several more. They were planted in a flat as a conve- 

 nient method of experimenting with their culture. They have 

 stood in the shade of a building, where they only get about an 

 hour of sunshine in the middle of the day, and entirely unpro- 

 tected, except that they were covered by snow for a few weeks 

 during last winter. They were planted very shallow, so that a 

 portion of the bulb is exposed above the surface, and they have 

 not been injured in the least by the severe weather. In its 

 wild state the Living-blade, which is the common name of this 

 plant, "grows in moist woodlands, but my experience seems to 

 show that it will thrive under ordinary care if partial shade is 

 given to it. 



Hammonton, N. J. 



Wm. F. Bassett. 



Vegetable Notes.— Our last sowing of American Wonder 

 Peas and Valentine Beans is made by the loth of August. We 

 shall make another sowing of Lettuce, using Deacon and 

 black-seeded Ferris Ball. Radishes we continue well into 

 September, sowing the small hardy red turnip variety. Prickly 

 Spinach, for fall use, is in by the 7th of August, and about tlie 

 first of September we shall make another sowing for winter- 

 ino- over. This is sown on ridges so as to shed water, and is 

 co'vered with light litter to protect it from frost. Lettuce may 

 be put into frames about the first of September and headed 

 up with the use of sashes. With protection it can be kept well 

 alono- into December. A few roots of Parsley for winter 

 pickfng should be placed in a corner of a frame, the smallest 

 roots being planted, as these are most easily established. A 

 few roots of Watercress are also desirable. It is surprising 

 how weU this plant does in an ordinary frame. 



Wellesley, Mass. 1. U. tl. 



The Forest. 



Suggestions from the White Pine Forests of 

 Minnesota. 



WHILE moving through the woods during a number of 

 years I have made some study of the great variety of cir- 

 cumstances under which the White Pine grows, in the hope of 

 discovering some of its preferences as shown by examples of 

 its best development under some more or less definite chain 

 of circumstances. Since some of the notes were taken I have 

 found that probably all the principles involved are known, but 

 as they are not known to every one it may be of use to present 

 and repeat them. Another object in offering the notes is that 

 others may find in them some suggestion in determining how 

 to plant and care for an artificial forest, or to aid them in the 

 more difficult task of taking any given piece of woodland and 

 making the best of it. In making a selection of these notes I 

 have used those only that may distinctly indicate the circum- 

 stances under which White Pine timber develops the best. In 

 general the iiistory of every forest is a record of disaster and 

 recovery. A new growth comes in after cutting and fire, and 

 the old trees are replaced by the young. 



(i) In a dense growth all of one species, especially if the soil 

 be poor or subject to drought, or to floods, much of the tim- 

 ber is found defective, especially with ring rot, owing probably 

 to imperfect nourishment of the tree, which is thus unable to 

 mature the annual growth of wood during unfavorable 

 seasons. 



(2) If the growth is not dense enough to subdue the lateral 

 branches, the trunks grow short and knotty, with a large pro- 

 portion of sapwood ; while Pine, started under Poplar and 

 Birch and kept closely surrounded by growing trees, has a 

 rapid upward growth free from branches, and forms tall, 

 straight, clear trunks, with little sapwood. 



(3) If a large trunk is to be grown in a short time, it should 

 be remembered that a tree started among an accompanying 

 growth that will never reach a great height or will soon be 

 overtopped by the Pines, but will yet remain densely shading 

 the trunk to a height of twenty feet, will probably produce a 



log sixteen feet long and two feet in diameter at the small end 

 in sixty years. 



(4) The fact that many of the large trees, otherwise sound 

 and vigorous, are hollow near the butt or throughout the butt 

 log, indicates that the sapling from tliree to eight inches in 

 diameter, which was barely able to exist under the overtop- 

 ping forest, may upon receiving sufficient light and nourish- 

 ment become vigorous ; and although the defective wood, 

 formed when the tree was unable to mature its wood, cannot 

 be replaced, it may be covered by sound wood, and the small 

 hollow left by the decay of this imperfect wood will not seri- 

 ously affect the value of the tree for lumber. 



(5) The best Pine timber is found scattered among hardwood 

 on fertile, porous, well-watered and well-drained loam, without 

 much humus, and is from loo to 200 years old and about 125 feet 

 high. The accompanying "hardwood" is usually younger, and 

 in Minnesota usually consists of Basswood, Maple, Red Oak 

 and Yellow Birch. 



(6) A good growth of sapling White Pine, some ten to twenty 

 inches in diameter, is frequently found overtopping and killing 

 White Birch, Poplar and Balsam Fir, which are then replaced 

 to some extent by Maple, Basswood, Oak and Yellow Birch. 



(7) A dense growth of White Birch or Poplar, ten to thirteen 

 feet high, is frequently found overtopping young White Pine. 



(8) On nearly every tract where mature White Pine-trees are 

 growing, White Pine-seedlings also are found, and often these 

 are numerous enough to retimber the tract thoroughly. 



(9) The mere cutting of the mature timber does not de- 

 stroy many of these little seedlings, but many are killed 

 either by too much exposure to the sun or by too much 

 shading. 



(10) The greatest danger to the seedHngs is from the fire 

 that usually follows the cutting, burning every shrub and small 

 tree, and frequently killing even the large trees, both conifers 

 and hardwoods that may have been left from the cutting. 



(11) Sometimes a fire has destroyed all except a few large 

 scattered Pine. In such a case the first growth to spring up is 

 Poplar, White Birch, Willow and Balsam. Under the shelter 

 of these saplings young Pines start, to eventually overtop the 

 less vigorous trees that have nursed them, and thus the tract 

 will be redmbered with the same species that covered it before. 



(12) A growth of timber can be secured at least expense by 

 selecting ground that is already well seeded, then cutting an 

 overtopping tree here or increasing the shade there, and, 

 above all, by carefully guarding against fire. 



(13) A good protection against fire may be formed by clear- 

 ing and cultivating under crops of Potatoes, Beans or Corn, a 

 strip at least four rods wide around the tract. Wagon-roads 

 also form a good protection, while even trails sometimes 

 check the progress of a fire, and are useful to make the forest 

 accessible to watchmen. 



(14) Conditions found in one forest are not necessarily found 

 also in another ; and principles that may apply in Minnesota 

 may not apply in New York or Pennsylvania, so one cannot 

 understand one region exactly bv studying another. For ex- 

 ample, much of the White Pine of Carlton County grows under 

 very different circumstances from that of Crow Wing County, 

 and so each tract under consideration needs to be examined ; 

 the whole ground needs to be studied, carefully mapped and 

 described before a definite method of treatment can be devised. 



It may be well to recapitulate and make more plain the 

 natural course of development which I think the notes indicate. 



Note 5 briefly describes the condition under which the best 

 White Pine-fimber is found, and the following notes are in- 

 tended to trace the tree back through its most prominent 

 stages of development to the tiny seedling, and even to show 

 under what conditions the seeds have been sown. To reverse 

 this order and begin with the parent trees left alive after a 

 disastrous fire : The first White Pine-seeds that fall on the bare 

 ground are not successful, but after a few years, when a pro- 

 tecting coppice of Poplars, etc., has developed, the Pine may 

 start under it. 



By a more vigorous upward growth the coppice is soon 

 overtopped, and then serves the Pine as a nurse, subduing 

 lateral branches, promoting upward growth, protecting against 

 shaking and evaporation by wind, preserving the snows of 

 winter until late in spring ; by deposits of leaves keeping frost 

 out of the ground, and thus permitting the percolation of water 

 during the winter ; mulching the soil and furnishing constant 

 nutriment not only by the decay of leaves and twigs, but more, 

 perhaps, by the ferfilization through worms, insects and other 

 small animals. 



The Pines outlive several generations of nurses, some of 

 which are valuable in themselves, and may be utihzed with 

 profit by cutfing before the Pine is cut. The inference may be 



