9^ 



BRITISH FOREST TREES. 



seem as yet to have been attempted or thought o£. 

 To form the roots properly mto knees, should the 

 plants be pretty large, the planter ought to select 

 those plants which have four main roots springing 

 out nearly at right angles, the regularity of which he 

 may improve a little by pruning, and plant them out 

 as standards in the thinnest dryest soil suited for 

 larch, carefully spreading the roots to equal distances 

 and in a horizontal position. To promote the regidar 

 square diverging of these four roots, he should dig 

 narrow ruts about a foot deep and three feet long 

 out from the point of each root, and fill them in 

 with the richest of the neighbom*ing turf along with 

 a little manm-e. When the plants are small, and 

 the roots only a tuft of fibres, he should dig two nar- 

 row ruts about eight feet long crossing each other at 

 the middle at right angles, fill these as above, and 

 put in the plant at the crossing : the rich mould of 

 the rotted turf and its softness from being dug, will 

 cause the plant to throw out its roots in the form of a 

 cross along the trenches. When the plants have 

 reached five or six feet in height, the earth may be 

 removed a Httle from the root, and, if more than one 

 stout root leader have run out into any of the four 

 trenches, or if any have entered the unstirred earth, 

 they ought all to be cut excepting one, the stoutest 



