chap. cv. couyla'ce^e. que'rcus. 1805 



taproot gives the plant new vigour, and enables it, after a few years, to exceed 

 in growth the native tree. And, 3dly, That large oak trees, whether native 

 or transplanted, do, long before they become fit for naval purposes (I may 

 say before they are proper for carpenter's uses), lose their taproots altogether. 

 In short, I would contend that all small oak trees have taproots, and all large 

 oaks have no taproots. I must, of course, be understood to speak in general 

 terms." (Bath Soc. Papers, vol. xv. p. 51.) 



Sowing the Acorns where the Plants are finally to remain. Several writers 

 recommend sowing acorns broadcast, and along with them hazel nuts, haws, 

 &c, and allowing the whole to grow up together. The undergrowths, in 

 this case, shelter the young oaks during the requisite period ; after which they 

 cease to increase in height, and are by degrees gradually choked and destroyed 

 by the shade of the oaks. This, however, is merely growing oaks among 

 weeds of a larger and more permanent kind, and cannot be recommended as a 

 scientific mode of raising oak woods, or woods of any other kind; though it 

 may be advisable to resort to it under circumstances where plantations of any 

 kind are better than none, and where there may be capital enough for pro- 

 curing the seeds, and committing them to the soil, though not enough for doing 

 so in a proper manner. This mode was also recommended by Sir Uvedale 

 Price, because, if no more oaks were sown than can stand on the ground as 

 full-grown trees, no thinning or future care of the plantation will ever be re- 

 quired by the planter. With a view to picturesque effect, such a mode is 

 judicious; but it is not so when either rapid growth or profit is the main 

 object. 



Nichols, writing in 1793, says he finds by experience that bushes of white 

 and black thorns, holly, and brambles, are the best nurses and protectors of 

 young timber trees, especially oaks. He, therefore, invented a dibble, which 

 will be found described in the Encyclopaedia of Arboriculture, in the chapter 

 on implements for dibbling acorns and other seeds into the heart of bushes, 

 and among underwood. He planted many acorns with this instrument, he 

 says, with the greatest success ; and he strongly recommends this mode as 

 better than any other for raising oak woods in the New Forest, (Methods, &c, 

 p. 64.) 



Marshall gives directions for raising oak woods; " oak," as he justly observes, 

 " being the only tree admissible in a wood, because no other tree will allow 

 copse to grow under it on land sufficiently sound and sufficiently level to 

 be cultivated conveniently with the common plough." (Planting and Rur. 

 Or., 2d ed., p. 128.) He prepares the ground by a naked or a turnip fallow, 

 as for wheat. At the proper season, he sows over the whole surface of the 

 future wood with corn or pulse broadcast, but rather thinner than usual. The 

 acorns he sows in drills across the lands, with intervening drills of temporary 

 trees and shrubs, to be removed as they advance in size, so as ultimately to 

 leave the oak trees 33 ft. apart every way. The details of this mode, being 

 applicable to the chestnut and other trees, as well as the oak, will be given in 

 the Encyclopaedia of Arboriculture. 



To raise a grove of oaks, Marshall proposes to sow drills of acorns alter- 

 nately with ash keys, treating the plants produced by the latter as under- 

 growths, till the oaks have attained a sufficient size, when the ash trees are to 

 be grubbed up. 



Billingtons opinion on this subject is decidedly in favour ot using plants 

 rather than acorns. He says, the raising of oak woods from sowing the 

 acorn in the place it is to remain till the tree comes to matuiity has been 

 a favourite theory with speculative men for ages. The plan has been tried 

 upon an extensive scale in the Forest of Dean, and in the New Forest in Hamp- 

 shire, and in some other smaller forests belonging to government in different 

 parts of the kingdom. As the experiment was made upon an extensive scale 

 in these two principal forests, and was found impracticable, it may be useful to 

 those persons who still think that the oak will make a tree sooner or better from 

 the acorn than from a transplanted plant, to point out the reasons of the failure 



