26 FOREST TREES. 
partially or wholly covered with young trees. These 
tracts are usually among the least valuable for tillage, 
and should therefore be protected from devastation. 
Rivers, bluffs, ravines and steep slopes liable to wash 
under cultivation, are better suited to the growth of 
wood than to any other purpose. 
Any farmer, although of small means, can plant at 
least an acre of trees in a year. When the ground 
for a grove or timber belt is selected, the outer rows 
may be first planted, and others added from year to 
year, as may be convenient. After the first three or 
four yeai's, the trees will need little or no cultivation, 
and will require only pruning, thinning, and the 
exclusion of stock. Every farm of forty acres or 
more should have a proportion approximating to a 
fixed ratio of wood and tillage land. This ratio may 
be fixed at thirty acres of wood in a quarter section 
of one hundred and sixty acres, which is somewhat 
less than one-fifth. The proprietor whose farm 
consists wholly of arable land, may think this too 
much; yet a careful consideration of the subject 
must convince any intelligent person that the land 
cannot be put to a better use. If the plan were 
generally adopted of planting timber belts on the 
north and west sides of farms on open plains, pro- 
tection would be afforded on the other two sides by 
neighboring plantations. A belt eight rods wide on 
two sides of a quarter section would give about the. 
required proportion of thirty acres. In addition to 
other advantages, a farm, one-fifth of which was 
covered with thriving young trees, would always 
