100 FOREST DISTRIBUTION 



in the experimental operations compared under dissimilar con- 

 ditions. The seeds within one year of tlieir production showed 

 from 3 to oiVr defective in different lots and species as deter- 

 mined by physical examination, while in the beds none of them 

 showed more than 10.4^c viable, although the most favorable 

 conditions were provided. This estimate of viable seeds, how- 

 ever, is doubtless much too low, owing to the fact that it was 

 based upon the number surviving at the end of the first season. 

 The percentage of response in germination showed no relation 

 to the percentage of apparently -^dable seeds by dissecticin. Thus 

 where Finns ponderosa showed 91% viable by dissection 10.4% 

 actually produced seedlings, while the same species in another 

 lot showed 94:9c apparently sound there resulted only l.l'/c of 

 seedlings, and in the case of the spruce the figures were respec- 

 tively 91% and 2.8% for one lot and 71% and 3% for another. 

 The only constant relation revealed by the studies seemed to be 

 that the time recjuired for germination is inversly proportioned 

 to the nmnber of seeds responding, or. in uther words, percentage 

 of germination and rapidity of response were directly propor- 

 tional, a condition to be expected. The results obtained from 

 the few species examined and experiments conducted under the 

 favorable/ conditions of cultivation suggest that the rate of 

 propagation in the field under natural conditions must be very 

 much less. It is seen also that radical differences obtain be- 

 tween seeds from different sources, as to size, soundness, and 

 response in germination, facts which must weigh in the final 

 determination of the place which each species must occupy in 

 the different parts of its range. 



Observation of the seedlings of this planting through a peri- 

 od of several years shows a marked acceleration of gro\\"th in 

 height after the seoorid year in nearly every case, being least in 

 the Engelmann spruce and most in the larch. The greatest 

 growth in height at the end of the first season was l^o inches 

 in the case of Douglas spruce, at the end of the second season 

 the larch with 13 inches and at the end of the fourth with 59 

 inches. The Douglas spruce reached a height of 22 inches at 

 the end of the fourth year, the yellow pine 23 inches, the white 

 pine 13. the lodgepole 27 and the spruce 16. though the latter 

 was exceptional, the heights in other lots of the spruce being 



