FLORA 



AND 5YLVA. 



Vol.1. No. 3.] JUNE, 1 903. [Monthly. 



BAG PLANTING. 



An old and dear friend of mine, long gathered to his fathers, had a particular 

 dread of a man going about London with a bag, and I am not sure a country- 

 man with a bag is very much better, so I wish to say something in favour of 

 a man with a bag on a wholly beneficent mission. If in any bold or varied 

 planting in unfamiliar soil we succeed in one half what we attempt we are for- 

 tunate ; and I think the best thing I ever did in planting was sowing a bare 

 field of some seven acres with Gorse. It was about to be planted — some part 

 was, in fact, already partly planted — with little forest trees, when I scattered the 

 seed broadcast over the field. The field was wired and rabbits kept out, and 

 after five or six years the effect of the Gorse, with the young Pines and Larch 

 growing up and standing a little above it, is splendid. An artist friend came 

 down lately and, standing amid the Oaks in a shaw near, drew a picture of the 

 field looking towards the distant hills. The warm colour of Gorse as a covert 

 in winter is pleasant ; I do not know the shrub that does so much for us, and 

 I have sown out of bags several hundredweight of seed in many situations. In 

 old woods it has less chance owing to the rabbits and partly to shade. On 

 railway banks, or bleak, dry, " brashy " places, it thrives and looks at home. 

 Where in clearing fences or old fields a difference of level often occurs — 

 the result of ages of ploughing — it is a good plan to sow Furze on the little 

 rough terraces. There would be no particular advantage in seeking this Furze 

 treasure where the bush abounds, as in many parts of Ireland, Cornwall, and 

 Devon; but in districts where, owing to the heaviness of the soil or other causes, 

 it is absent, it is one of the handsomest bushes one could raise. 



As to sowing among young forest trees, I simply take advantage of the 

 spaces between them, and, instead of the Furze being a hindrance to the 

 young trees, it is a gain, inasmuch as the Furze thickly planted is a soil-maker, 

 its leaves falling thickly, and the rapid-growing Pines, closely planted, as they 

 ought always to be, will, after some years, get clean above it and finally get the 

 field to itself. In making the best of fences, the live fence, Furze seed scattered 

 along the banks comes up very soon ; it looks very beautiful in such places, 

 and helps to make the fence a more sheltering, dividing line. As so many are 



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