32 
BULLETIN" 11, U. S. DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE. 
Under this method the stand is cut to a rough diameter limit, either 
because it does not actually pay to cut trees below that limit or 
because it is wished to leave trees to form the basis for a second cut 
10 to 20 years later. 
If, in pure well-stocked stands, a large number of trees remain 
after lumbering by the diameter-limit method, excellent results will 
often be had both in the growth of trees left and in the seeding of a 
new stand, the cutting, in its effects, amounting to a modified form of 
the method of successive thinnings. The chief drawback is that the 
small-crowned overtopped trees, such as would be left under this 
method, require a number of years to recover from suppression 
before producing much seed; and, furthermore, a large proportion of 
them usually die or are windthrown or broken within a few years 
after lumbering, especially on dry and exposed situations. It some- 
times happens, however, as shown in Table 25, that the area cut under 
this method is immediately seeded up from seed produced by the 
large-crowned trees removed at the cutting, or from seed trees left in 
the vicinity of the area cut. Table 25 is a summary of the results 
of cutting a half-acre plot in a 35-year-old fully stocked stand of 
loblolly pine on fresh, sandy soil, to a diameter limit of 12 inches 
breasthigh in the winter of 1904. The stand was measured in 1906, 
and remeasured 4J years later. It indicates what sometimes happens, 
under favorable conditions, in cutting by the ordinary diameter-limit 
method. (See Plate III.) 
Table 25. — Effect of a diameter-limit cutting on a half acre of even-aged, fully stocked 
loblolly pine 35 years old. 
TREES REMOVED, TREES DYING, AND GROWTH OF TREES REMAINING. 
Remaining. 
Removed, 
Died, 
1906-1910. 
1904. 
1900 
1910 
65 
53 
44 
9 
13(12.8) 
8.4 
9.1 
7.9 
70 
60 
60.3 
60 
1.638 
493 
475 
69 
8,450 
1,900 
2,400 
270 
Increase 
( + ) or de- 
crease (— ) 
in 4i years. 
Number of trees 
Average diameter breasthigh 
Average height 
Volume (without bark) cubic feet. . 
Volume (mill scale) board feet. . . 
Per cent. 
-17 
+ 7.7 
+ .05 
4-3.7 
+26.3 
AMOUNT AND GROWTH OF LOBLOLLY-PINE REPRODUCTION ON THE HALF ACRE. 
Size. 
Number. 
I 
1906 | 1910 
to 2 feet in height 
2 to 4 feet in height 
4 to 6 feet in height 
1 inch in diameter breasthigh . . 
2 inches in diameter breasthigh 
3 inches in diameter breasthigh 
720 
101 
32 
S 
125 
203 
214 
02 
5 
