FOREST PLANTATIONS AT BILTMORE, N. C. 11 



APPROACH ROAD PLANTATION 



An excellent example of the overtopping of hardwoods by pine of a 

 later planting — a result to be frequently noticed in the Biltmore 

 plantations — is afforded by the Approach Road plantation. Yellow 

 poplar and black cherry were planted here by Gifford Pinchot in the 

 spring of 1895, both being spaced 4 by 4 feet. The poplar planting 

 stock averaged 5 feet high, the cherry 3% feet. The spring of 1895 

 was wet and warm and very favorable for tree growth; but the 

 summer was unusually dry, and the plants began to dry out. About 

 July 1 the plants with dried tops were cut back. Most of these 

 promptly put out new shoots, but 40 per cent of the plants thus cut 

 back had died within two years after planting. Eight years later 

 the plantation was regarded as a total failure, and 1-year-old shortleaf 

 pine seedlings were accordingly put in to take the place of the 

 hardwoods. 



Despite the 10-year handicap which the pines had to overcome they 

 have for the most part overtopped the remaining hardwoods, aver- 

 aging about 5 feet taller. Dominant hardwood trees occur here and 

 there in the stand, and scattered through it are some of the best 

 of the planted yellow poplars at Biltmore. (PL 5, A.) As a rule, 

 however, planted yellow poplar trees have not done as well at Biltmore 

 as those that started naturally from seed blowm in upon the site. 



FARMCOTE PLANTATION 



Another example of the suppression of hardwoods by pine is the 

 Farmcote plantation, established in 1905. In part of this plantation 

 two rows of sugar maple were planted to every row of pine, the pine 

 rows being alternately of white pine and shortleaf. Thus the single 

 rows of pine w^ere flanked on each side by double rows of maple. 

 Even with this arrangement the maples have not been able to compute 

 successfully with the pines and the stand is now made up of wide- 

 spaced alternating rows of white and shortleaf pines with a few 

 small maples between. The pines at 18 years of age averaged 35 feet 

 high, where as the average for the maples was 8 feet, and some were 

 only a foot high. 



In another part of this plantation is a stand of alternate row^s of 

 white and shortleaf pine, a little more than 5 feet apart, the trees 

 averaging 3 feet apart in the rows. The two species are about even 

 in size but with the white pine slightly larger, contrary to the usual 

 relation between the two species at Biltmore. The trees at 18 years 

 of age stood 2,600 to the acre, which is only 58 per cent of the number 

 originally planted. 



BLACK WALNUT PLANTATION 



The Black Walnut plantation, on the west side of the French Broad 

 River, not far from the ferry, contains the only black walnut stand 

 resulting from the many plantings and sowings of this species at 

 Biltmore. In this small stand the black walnuts at 24 years of age 

 averaged 20 feet high and 2% inches in diameter. Some of the biggest 

 were 40 feet high, and 6 or 7 inches in diameter. 



In contrast with this fairly successful stand are the plantings 

 higher up the slope on poorer walnut soil, where the walnuts have 

 never done at all well. After these poorer trees had struggled along 



