334 



Garden and Forest. 



[Sei'Temeer 5, 



The operations of tliinning-, cutting, planting and sowing 

 are all directed to securmg the natural reproductions of 

 the forest with the least possible expenditure of money, 

 to which the element of time is properly considered sub- 

 ordinate. There are, of course, exceptions to this rule, 

 as in the case of a forest of Conifers growing upon a level 

 sandy plain, when it is often more economical to cut 

 down all the trees, grub up the roots, and replant, than to 

 allow the forest to reproduce itself naturally liy means of 

 self-sown seeds 



The deciduous forests or bodies of woods now found 

 in the more thickly settled portions of the Eastern ami 

 Northern States, and generally connected with farms, are 

 usually of two classes: (i ) Woods composed almost entirely 

 of old trees, belonging to species of comparatively little 

 economic value, the trees valuable for timber or for fuel 

 having been cut from time to time when needed on the 

 farm or to bring in a little money. The excessive pastur- 

 age to which all such woodland is subjected has prevented 

 the growth of young trees to replace those which have 

 been cut, and has destroyed the undergrowth which pro- 

 tects seedling trees, checks evaporation from the surface, 

 where the forest-floor is not densely shaded, and by pre- 

 venting the blowing away of the fallen leaves, helps to 

 increase its coating of vegetable mould. Such woods, 

 when the}' arc not injured by excessive pasturage, often 

 suffer by the rooting of hogs, which destroy many young 

 trees, and, by selecting the sweet seeds of the White Oaks, 

 the Chestnut and the Beech, and discarding the bitter 

 acorns of the Black Oaks, are, in some parts of the 

 countr)', gradually changing the composition of deciduous 

 forests. The trees which remain in these old woods often 

 show, in dead branches and dying tops, the effects of 

 injudicious thinning, and of the exhaustion which exces- 

 sive pasturage brings, sooner or later, to every forest. 



(2) Coppice-woods — that is, woods composed largely of 

 suckers, or the growth from the stumps of trees ]>reviously 

 cut, it being the custom in some parts of the country, es- 

 pecially in New England, to cut a piece of woods clean, 

 leaving the old stumps to furnish a fresh supply of trees. 

 The disadvantages of this system are, that stump-shoots 

 never make as long-lived or valuable trees as seedlings ; 

 that as each old stump produces several shoots, these are 

 crowded together so that no one of them is able to grow 

 into a good tree ; that some species of trees produce 

 shoots from the stump more freely and more vigor(.)usly 

 than others, so that if left to themselves, these species 

 must eventually occupy the ground, to the exclusion of 

 all others, and that, as a stump loses its power to produce 

 shoots, after two or three crops have been taken from it, a 

 wood treated continually in this way must either disap- 

 pear eventually or change the character of its composition. 

 Animals are not less injurious to the coppice than to the 

 wood in which old trees have been left standing ; they 

 devour and break down the young shoots or root them 

 out entirely. 



The first thing to be done, if a piece of deciduous 

 woods, whatever its character, condition or extent, is to be 

 improved and made permanently profitable, is to exclude 

 from it rigorously all browsing animals. Then the owner 

 must decide what sort of trees he desires his woods 

 to be composed of principally. The nature of the soil 

 and the character of the native vegetation should primarily 

 determine his choice, which may depend secondarily, how- 

 ever, upon the purposes to which his forest-crop is to be ap- 

 plied, and upon probable future local demands for timber. 

 In European countries, where the number of species of trees 

 growing naturally is very small, the scientific forester is rare- 

 1)' compelled to occup)'- himself with forests composed of 

 more than two different deciduous trees, the Oak and the 

 Beech, but in American forests, where sometimes twent)' or 

 thirty species of more or less valuable trees are closely asso- 

 ciated together in small areas, the difficulties of forest man- 

 agement aregreatly increased, and wehavestill to learn how 

 a mixed forest of man}' species can be most profitably 



worked. At present, at least, the owner must select the 

 most valuable species among those which grow the most 

 freely on his ground, and then, the crop being thus decid- 

 ed upon, devote himself to the development and the suc- 

 cession of the individuals of those species. The nature of 

 the crop being thus determined upon, all the trees, in 

 the case of woods of the class first described, not belong- 

 ing to an}' of the species which are to be perpetuated 

 and which have passed their prime and therefore cannot 

 be profitably left standing, should be cut. The condition 

 of a tree can be roughly decided by an examination of its 

 top ; when the upper branches begin to fail, it is a sign 

 that it is no longer in a healthy condition or capable of 

 producing much more material. A tree in scientific fores- 

 try is considered ripe and ready for the axe when the bulk 

 of its annual increase of wood diminishes or does not in- 

 crease. This information is easily obtained by means of 

 a simple mechanical contrivance which enables the forester 

 to measure the exact thickness of the annual deposits 

 of wood without injury to the tree and so to determine 

 accurately the annual increase of material. If old individu- 

 als belonging to the species to be perpetuated in the 

 forest exist, they should be left to bear seed, from which 

 the future forest is to spring ; and the condition of these 

 old trees can often be greatly improved and their lives 

 considerably prolonged, by cutting away all dead branches, 

 by shortening the others, and by reducing the heads. This 

 process not only increases the vigor of the individual, but 

 allows the light to penetrate to the forest-floor about it, and 

 so enables the seed which falls to germinate and grow. 

 Young trees, if any exist of the species selected, must from 

 time to time be freed from the encroachment of undesira- 

 ble neighl)ors, and the seedlings, which will soon appear 

 after animals are excluded from the forest and light is ad- 

 mitted by the removal of decrepit or useless trees, must 

 be thinned every few years. Gradually, as the young trees 

 grow up, the remnants of the old forest may be removed — 

 first, the unpruned trees of the non-selected species, not 

 cut when the improvement vi-as undertaken, and then 

 finally, and after the ground is sufficiently stocked with 

 seedlings, the old seed-bearing trees of the selected sorts. 

 The management of a coppice, with the exceptions that 

 there are no old trees to remove, and that the ground is 

 already stocked with a growth of shoots all of the same 

 age, is practically the same. The variety of trees of which 

 the woods is to be composed being determined .upon, their 

 growth must be encouraged, and the others removed. 

 When several shoots proceed from a single stem only one 

 should be left to grow, unless it is found that a particular 

 forest can more profitably produce posts or railroad ties 

 than timber of larger dimensions, in which case better re- 

 turns are often obtained by allowing several stems to grow 

 up together. A mixed system is often found the most pro- 

 fitable in the treatment of a wood originall}' coppice. A 

 certain nimiber of trees are, at the outset, selected to 

 grow to maturity. All the rest of the shoots are then cut 

 away to allow these selected trees to grow without inter- 

 ference, and thus to get a good start. The next crop of 

 stump-shoots grow up, preventing the growth of side 

 branches on the standard trees, but without interfering 

 otherwise with their development, and serving as an under- 

 growth and protection to the forest floor. The old stumps, 

 after two or three crops of coppice-wood have been taken, 

 cease to be productive, and the ground which they filled, 

 unless it is too shaded by the standard trees, is finally 

 occupied with a growth of seedlings. 



There should be in a perfectly healthy and satisfactory 

 forest three stories of vegetation, so to speak, ist. A growth 

 of tall trees, near enough together to insure the develop- 

 ment of tall, straight stems, without low side branches, 

 which destroy their value for timber ; but not so near that 

 their heads exclude all light from the forest floor, and so 

 prevent the growth among them of other plants ; 2d. A 

 crop of younger trees growing under and among the last, 

 cither of the same species or of some valuable species 



