224 



LETTERS ON TREES* 



cently awarded him a Gold Medal* By permission, 

 I am enabled to append certain details to these 

 Letters. They relate exclusively to two kinds of 

 timber — Larch and Scotch Fir — and are comprised 

 under the head of General Observations.'' They 

 are as follows : — 



" For the first twenty- five years, it may be prudent to 

 assume, that, in a purely agricultural district, where there is 

 not a scarcity of wood, no return whatever will be derived from 

 a Larch and Scots Fir plantation, — any price obtained for 

 thinnings being exhausted, if not more than exhausted, in the 

 expense of cutting. In ordinary cases, after the lapse of 

 twenty-five years, — or, say, thirty years at the most, — the 

 thinnings become fit for fencing, coal- props, &c. ; and if the 

 plantation be a thriving one, and the locality within an average 

 distance of conveyance by water or rail — suppose five miles,— the 

 returns become considerable. It were a very moderate estimate 

 to assume, that, for the period of the plantation's age, between 

 thirty and forty, a free annual return of 10s. per acre may be 

 obtained. At the end of forty years, we may assume that 450 

 trees per acre will remain — say one half Larch and one half 

 Scots Firs.f If still in a thriving condition, few will be sold 

 for some years ; they are too old for coal- props and fencing, 

 and, generally, too young for fiooring, railway- sleepers, &c. 



* This report will appear in the ^' Transactions " of the Society — 

 to be published in January 1856. 



f The plantation to which Mr Smith's report relates, was laid 

 down (in 1851) in the proportion, per acre, of 2400 two-year-old 

 seedling Scots Firs, and 600 two-year-old seedling Larches — and in 

 such manner that the subsequent thinnings should be chiefly confined 

 to the Scots Firs. 



