282 OUR FORESTS AND WOODLANDS 
larch, while it allows greater scope to the forester 
in adapting his stock of standard trees to suit 
the prospects of the market in the comparatively 
near future. It is a system of management well 
suited for the growth of light-demanding trees, 
and especially of oak, ash, and larch; while the 
finest returns will be obtained on fresh soils in 
sheltered situations, with light-crowned standards 
and a dense underwood consisting of ash, syca- 
more, maple, hazel, beech, &c., which reproduce 
themselves freely, and are capable of bearing a 
considerable amount of shade under such favour- 
able conditions. 
In most British copses both the overwood and 
the underwood show deviations to a greater or 
less extent from the conditions desirable for 
economic treatment. As regards the standards, 
the trees, usually oak for the most part, run far 
too much into branches, and the boles are defec- 
tive, while many of them are over-mature, and 
should have been felled long ago to make way 
for a younger crop of more vigorous growth. 
Again, the overwood is nothing like regularly 
distributed over the falls, and there is no normal 
gradation of ‘age-classes’ throughout it. Then 
