6io 



Garden and Forest. 



fNUMBER 252. 



leaves may furnish sufficient protection to preserve its vitality. 

 When nature is permitted to carry out her own plan of propa- 

 gating the Wliite Pine her work is more irregular than when 

 assisted by man. Should tlie seeds leave the cones when there 

 is but little force to the wind, they will drop very near each 

 other at no great distance from the parent tree, and the result 

 will be that a hundred small trees will grow on a space not 

 large enough for more than one large one ; but if the seeds 

 leaVe the cones when the wind is liigh they will be carried 

 "Teat distances and spread over a wide territory. When man, 

 without too much labiir, can assist nature in the more even 

 distribution of the seed it is desirable he should do so, but 

 when he cannot, he may be able to prevent crowding by re- 

 moving some of the small trees where they cover the ground 

 too thickly, and setting them out in another place where they 

 cannot interfere with each other. 



When the seed is to be planted by man, the cones should 

 be o-athered just before the first frost in the autumn and placed 

 small end up in the grass away from all enemies. After the 

 first heavy frost, gather up the cones and shell out the seed by 

 turning them small end downward over a vessel and giving 

 tliem a rap with a stick, when the seeds will drop out. As soon 

 as the seed is shelled it should be planted ; it is a mistake to 

 dry Pine-seed several months before planting. 



The method of planting must depend on the condition of 

 the soil ; if it is a barren plain, shallow furrows may be plowed 

 from east to west five feet apart, turning the furrows to the 

 south, to afford a partial shade to the young plants. The seed 

 should be planted on the south side of the open furrow, drop- 

 ping two seeds near each other, then leaving a ?pace of four 

 or five feet, and covering the seeds with earth enough to keep 

 them moist, say not far from one-half an inch in depth. (4) On 

 rocky land, or where the soil is hard, dig out with a sharp 

 spade a small sod where the seeds are to be planted, leaving 

 the sod near the hole on the south side for shade, and planting 

 the seed the same as in furrows. In a favorable season 

 enough seed will germinate to cover the land ; but if the 

 season be unfavorable, a portion of the land will have to 

 be reseeded the following year. Where the land is shaded by 

 trees, germination will be more certain ; but in such places 

 when the seedling Pines are two years old, they should be let 

 out into the sunshine by removing the trees that shade them. 



In localities where seedling Pines that grow naturally are 

 numerous, it is not expensive to cover land with Pines by 

 transplanting the young trees ; to do this to the best advan- 

 tage trees should be selected that are not over six inches in 

 height, and in removing them a small ball of earth should be 

 removed with each tree, care being taken not to expose the 

 roots to the light or the air, and it is always best to do the work 

 on cloudy days. The trees should be set five or six feet apart, 

 and as they grow a sufficient number should be cut out to 

 prevent crowding. When large enough for box-boards or 

 coarse lumber, not more than four or five trees should be left 

 on each rod of land. 



On an average soil, thirty-five years is sufficient to produce 

 White Pine timber of a profitable size to cut for coarse lumber, 

 and, as a rule, on our New England soil ; it is more profitable 

 to cut the trees at this age than it is to let them stand long 

 enough to produce trees large enough for clear lumber. It is 

 a mistake to suppose that trees large enough and good enough 

 for clear lumber can be grown on any soil ; it is only on soils 

 best adapted to the growth of the White Pine that it is wise to 

 let the trees stand after they are more than twenty inches in 

 diameter. On ordinary, and even on very barren, soils, the 

 young trees grow quite rapidly, and unless the soil is very un- 

 favorable, they will make a satisfactory growth until the largest 

 trees are ten or twelve inches in diameter ; beyond this size, if 

 the land be well covered with trees, a very large portion of 

 them will show signs of decay, and only a few growing in the 

 most favored places will confinue to grow rapidly ; thus the 

 decay on the lot will be nearly equal to the growth. 



While it requires but from twenty-five to thirty-five years to 

 grow the White Pine large enough for box-boards, it requires 

 from sixty to seventy years to grow it large enough for clear 

 lumber. When we consider the fact that there is always a 

 ready sale, at remunerative prices, for coarse lumber, and also 

 the uncertainty of getting first quality of lumber by thirty years 

 of additional growth, it would seem unwise to encourage own- 

 ers of Pine-timber forests to let the trees stand after they are 

 large enough for coarse lumber, except on land strong enough 

 to keep up a rapid growth until the trees are three feet or more 

 in diameter. (5) 



Four White Pine-trees set thirty-one years ago now measure, 

 three feet from the ground, as follows : one sixty inches in cir- 

 cumference, one sixty-five inches and two sixty-six inches ; the 



sixly-five-inch tree grows in a wet soil, the remaining three are 

 in a gravelly loam not rich enough to produce more than 800 

 poimds of hay to the acre. These trees when transplanted 

 were not over six inches in height, and they have grown with 

 other trees set at the same time so near each other that they 

 now completely shade the land. Two trees set on a poor grav- 

 elly knoll twenty-five years ago now measure thirty-three and 

 thirty-nine inches in circumference ; these trees were about 

 twelve inches in height when set ; they have grown on open 

 land. 



There have been many opinions advanced in regard to thin- 

 ning and trimming White Pine forests, and these divergent 

 views have to some extent been caused by a difference of 

 opinion as to how long the trees should be permitted to grow. 

 If a Pine-forest is to be cut when large enough for coarse lum- 

 ber, it should be treated differently from one that it is to stand 

 long enough to make clear lumber ; but little need be done with 

 the former except to cut out the dead and dying trees, while 

 the latter should be carefully looked after from the time the 

 trees are eight feet high until the limbs on the trunk are all off 

 to the height of twenty or more feet. As early in the growth 

 of the forest as possible, the trees that are to remain for lum- 

 ber should be selected, and the lower limbs on the trunk cut 

 off as fast as it is considered safe to do so and not injure the 

 vigor of the tree ; this work should be done in June. After 

 having chosen the trees that are to make the future forest, all 

 the trees between them should be kept back and destroyed as 

 fast as they appear to crowd the selected trees ; but it is well 

 to let the trees between stand quite near to the selected ones 

 until they are twenty feet high it they do not overshadow them. 

 By so doing the trees will grow higher and the trunks will have 

 fewer limbs, thus securing clear lumber ; in fact, a good White 

 Pine timber-tree rarely ever grows in 'an exposed position ; it 

 must grow where it is surrounded by other trees, or it will not 

 make a long, straight and clear timber-log ; he who is to trim 

 a timber-lot must ever keep this fact in mind, and do his work 

 in such a manneras will best assist nature in her efforts to pro- 

 duce trees of the best type for man's use. It is not wise to at- 

 tempt to grow more than 160 or 170 timber-trees to the acre, 

 but by the selection of this number when Jhe forest is young, 

 they may be given ample room to develop, and there will be 

 left room between them to grow a limited number of trees 

 large enough for box-boards. Edmund Hersey. 



The article on White Pine, submitted for my examina- 

 tion, contains many good ideas and correct statements, but 

 is not, in my opinion, correct in all respects. It contains 

 many theories that are novel and which need to be proven, 

 and some theoretically correct ideas which do not admit of 

 practical application. For convenience I have indicated 

 the passages with digits upon which I have commented. 



(1) While certainly the White Pine will grow, and even 

 thrive, on a wide range of soils, it would be misleading to 

 name a badly drained soil, like peat-meadows, as a lo- 

 cality for it when speaking of its cultivation, and it should 

 have been stated that the best site for it is a fresh to moist, 

 well-drained sand-soil, although even a drier soil yields 

 good results if only deep or permeable enough. 



(2) This method of securing seed is neither necessary, 

 nor in most cases practicable. It has, on the contrary, 

 been well established for most coniferous seed, that a cer- 

 tain time of after-ripening increases the per cent, of germi- 

 nation. Most Pine-seeds are best kept over winter and 

 sown in spring, as nature does. The White Pine is a 

 curious exception, shedding its cones in the fall, and 

 thereby indicating, perhaps, that fall-sowing is preferable 

 for it. 



(3) The theory that frost opens the cones is new. It is 

 the drying by evaporation from the scales, and the conse- 

 quent contraction of the outer-cell elements at their base, 

 which makes the scales open ; the same process vs'hich 

 makes leaves and cones drop eventually. As the cones 

 open near the beginning of October, he who waits for frost 

 may lose his harvest. He had better cut the cones the first 

 weeks of September, spread them on a dry place, a gently 

 sloping roof, for instance, where the sun will open them, 

 and the seeds can be readily knocked out and swept to- 

 gether, or else the drying may be done in warm rooms. 

 The resin on the cones will prevent many seeds from fall- 



