cruickshank's practical planter. 351 



Mr Oruicksliank's opinions regarding pruning and 

 thinning are generally not very incorrect. His com- 

 mencing sentence on pruning, that " most decidu- 

 ous trees, if left to themselves, have a tendency to 

 grow with short trunks, containing little timber, 

 and to waste their strength on large unweildy tops," 

 would, however, lead us to form a different conclu- 

 sion. The very tall, clean, straight, deciduous trees, 

 in the American forests, give a sufficient answer to 

 this. We like his remark respecting thinning, that 

 " it is only efficacious when applied as a preventive, 

 not as a cure." 



Mr Cruickshank next brings forward his plan of 

 raising oak forest, which appears to have been his 

 own invention, although invented before. When- 

 ever mice and other gnawers (glires) are not very 

 abundant, it, if properly executed, would seem to be 

 the best method of raising oak forest ; and, indeed, 

 in many situations, the only practicable one. Mr 

 Cniickshank's method coincides nearly with Mr 

 Sang's, only he does not carry his system of protec- 

 tion so far as Mr Sang, in first raising belts of 

 the most hardy kinds of timber, distributed to 

 windward of, and intersecting the place intended to 

 be planted, in such a manner as to afford the best 

 possible shelter from the coldest most destructive 



