41' 



Where the land is sandy, and the prevailing timber is blackjack oak, with 

 somrf hickories and burr oaks, hickory, locust, burr and black jack oak, red 

 pine, Scotch pine, Scotch larch, Norway spruce, cedar, and chestnuts will 

 thrive. As this sand becomes more dry, only jrines, larch, spruce, red cedar, 

 and black jack oak may be expected, but the growth will be slow of course. 

 Where the land becomes moist but not swampy; the white elm, hackberry, 

 white and black ash, butternut, hickory, white pine, swamp white oak, birch, 

 tamarack, red maple and white cedar will be timber to choose from ; and in 

 still wetter land, the tamarack, red maple, black ash, birch and willow will 

 grow. The overflowed river lands must be planted with such trees as the 

 natural growth may indicate. 



But in making all plantations, the planter must not forget the great prin- 

 ciple of rotation, which governs every well informed farmer ; whether we 

 adopt the theory, that roots, besides drawing from the soil such properties 

 as are required by each variety of plants, until all those which they can 

 reach are exhausted ; or that the roots have also the power to cast ©if waste 

 or deliterious matter, makes no difference with the fact, that if the same 

 kindtof plants grow for a sufiSciently long period of time in the same ground, 

 the soil will become unfit for their longer production, until it is renovated. 

 In scientific farming this renovation is affected by manuring the surface of 

 the ground, and by a rotation of crops, which require other ingredients from 

 the soil. Acting on this principle, it would seem, that ground which ,has 

 been producing the long tap-rooted oaks, should be planted with'maples, but- 

 ternuts, locusts, basswoods, elms and pines, whose roots spread nearer the sur- 

 face ; and that oaks, on the other hand, should be placed on the prairies, 

 which have been producing grasses. To those who have observed the changes 

 which take place in the timber that grows up as the second crop where old . 

 trees have been cleared away, will find a cause for that growth in this prin- 

 ciple underlying the necessity of rotation of crops. 



The forms of. the tree belts, as well as the trees of which they are com- 

 posed, may be varied almost infinitely. Before we suggest any.form at all, 

 we will premise : that in all belts, those rows of trees nest to land which 

 must be plowed, or mowed, as well as highways, should consist of such trees 

 only, as strike their roots nearly perpendicularly, or if not, of such as do not 

 send up suckers naturally, nor because the roota may chance to be wounded 

 or cut by the plow. This rule will suggest, the oak, the pines, the larches, 

 the hickories and the cedars. They should also be disposed naturally to 

 grow in a perpendicular, or pyramidal form, so that they shall not shade the 

 ground by throwing out l6ng horizontal branches ; this rule excludes the 

 oaks ; and lastly the outermost tier should be an evergreen of well known 

 hardiness, and one that will retain its limbs and foliage near the ground. 

 This rule will leave the red cedar, as the first and best choice, though the 

 white might at times be taken. These trees answer all the conditions. la 

 the second tier of trees, the hickories fill all the conditions, and the pine 



