TNE GROUP METHOD. 361 



tliis contlngenoy the preparatory fellings will be made on the very 

 same principles as in the uniform method. This will also be the 

 case, if the group is so large that the surrounding forest cannot 

 exercise any influence on its vegetation and reproduction except 

 over only a very small fraction of its area. And so on. Hence it 

 may be laid down as a general rule that, unless the group is very 

 large, the amount of felUng to be effected inside it will depend not 

 only on its own condition, but also on the density of the surround- 

 ing groups, the share they can take in its regeneration, and the ex- 

 tent to which they themselves can bear being thinned out in order 

 to let in light sideways. In other words, under no circumstance 

 should the leaf-canopy be opened out in any marked degree or 

 over any considerable area, a limitation that is not difficult of obser- 

 vance, since the essential character ot the method is not to under- 

 take regeneration operations except where conditions favourable to 

 success are already indicated. 



We thus see that preparatory operations lose here nearly all the 

 great importance which necessarily attaches to them in the uniform 

 method. Often they can be dispensed with, and where they are 

 required, they assume more the character of an ordinary tliinning 

 (see Book III). 



AETIOLE 2. 



The seed-felling 



Like the preparatory fellings, the seed-felhng also may become un- 

 necessary owing to the presence of advance growth. Where there is 

 no advance growth, there of course it cannot be omitted; but in pro- 

 portion to the diminishing size of the group and the consequently in- 

 creasing certainty of complete sowing from outside, it gradually 

 dwindles down to a mere preparation of the soil, the effects of which 

 need not last beyond the following two or three years. Consistently 

 with the principle, always to be observed in the group method, of 

 keeping the leaf-canopy everywhere as full as possible, the seed- 

 coupe, except when the area of the group is extensive, will be 

 darker than under similar circumstances in the uniform method • 

 for in addition to the various considerations which regulate the 

 severity of the felling in that method, we have the two following : 



(i) Lateral illumination. If the surrounding groups are open 

 enough, a considerable amount of sidehght will find its way inside 

 through them ; and, if the growth in those groups is very dense, 

 it will always bear being thinned out, thereby saving to a certain 

 the leaf-canopy in the enclosed group. 



