294 SUCCESSION CROPS OF WOOD. 



sides its naturally drawn up and scraggy aspect, most 

 of it will have been disfigured by the falling of the 

 trees, and to an inexperienced eye it will seem utterly 

 unsusceptible of ever being brought to any thing su- 

 perior to brushwood. By proceeding with it, how- 

 ever, according to the following plan, it will soon 

 assume a more favourable appearance. Cut it all 

 down within two or three inches of the ground, with 

 the exception of bushes here and there, which ought 

 to be left for the purpose of shelter. This work 

 should be performed in the winter season, and the 

 following summer strong and healthy shoots will be 

 sent forth. These are afterwards to be thinned and 

 pruned as occasion may require, and the repetition 

 of these processes at proper intervals, will be all the 

 labour necessary to train up these shoots into fine 

 and thriving trees. 



These remarks relate to the raising of succession 

 crops of wood when the former crop consisted of firs. 

 Most of the hard-wooded species send forth shoots 

 or suckers from the roots after the trees are cut 

 down ; and these suckers may with great facility be 

 trained up into timber. It is singular, that, except- 

 ing in the case of the oak alone, scarce any attention 

 should have ever been given to this method of re- 

 newing plantations, — especially as a shoot springing 



