33 



the method, it may be adopted. It is exceedingly easy to 

 apply and to work. ^ 



The coppice selection method has hitherto only been 

 applied in India to bamboo forests. There do not appear to 

 be any good grounds for extending its application to other 

 Kinds of crops. 



The branch coppice method must not, of course, be ap- 

 plied in areas set aside for the production of timber ; but it 

 IS useful under certain circumstances, for instance where 

 fodder is more valuable than timber, and where a regular 

 supply of small fuel and leaf fodder must be furnished by 

 forests worked for local use. The method may also in some 

 cases be employed in connection with the management of 

 pasture lands. 



The method of coppice with standards is admirably 

 adapted to the circumstances prevailing very generally in 

 the plains of India, and ought to be more largely made use 

 of than is actually the case. It meets, generally better than 

 any other method, domestic requirements in small fuel, and 

 at the same time furnishes a considerable quantity of timber 

 of large dimensions suitable for the manufacture of imple- 

 ments and furniture. As compared with tree-growth in 

 high forest, the reserved stems increase in girth more 

 rapidly ; and many species essentially light-loving accom- 

 modate themselves readily to this treatment. In a country 

 where a fluctuating demand is the rule, the method has 

 also this advantage that the standard trees can be felled in 

 greater or lesser number as is required, or may be allowed 

 to grow to a larger size without disorganising the working. 

 The working-plan itself is, moreover, exceedingly simple in its 

 arrangement, easy both to understand and to apply. As 

 regeneration is principally obtained by means of coppice, the 

 method can only be applied to broad-leaved species. The 

 whole of the produce must, as a rule, be saleable to make the 

 application of the method profitable. 



* Toungya cultivation, it need hardly be said, should 



* Teak toungya cultivation in Burma meaus a combination of arboricultural operations 

 with shifting cultivation as practised by wild tribes, who cut and burn the existing vege- 

 tation in order to raise one or two crops of cereals or other food crops or cotton. When 

 these crops are sown, small teak seedlings are planted by the cultivators at the same 

 time, usually at a distance of six feet by six feet. They are carefully weeded for a few 

 years ; and the result is that a much more valuable tree-crop springs up than that which 

 originally had possession of the ground. 



Cultivation of this kind, but in which the subsequent artificial rearing of young trees 

 is generally wanting, is called jTiim in Bengal and Assam ; lehil and Tcordli in the North- 

 West Himalaya; heixar in the Central Provinces; and Icumri, podu, etc., in South India, 

 Similar cultivation is or was practised in some European countries. 



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