282  Plantations  and  Home  Nurseries  Competition , 1910. 
to  be  of  a parallel  nature  to  forming  a walled  garden  in  a 
productive  district. 
The  rest  of  plantations  entered  were  on  much  poorer  soils 
of  greatly  different  natures.  That  at  Abbeystead  in  Wyresdale, 
Lancashire,  the  property  of  the  Earl  of  Sefton,  is  chiefly  on 
peaty  loam  on  clay,  but  in  places  sandy,  overlying  the  mill- 
stone grit.  As  the  rainfall  here  is  fairly  heavy  (52  in.),  the 
porosity  of  the  underlying  rocks,  once  the  water  reaches  them, 
is  of  value  in  preventing  chill  to  the  trees.  Besides,  the  planta- 
tion generally  is  on  fairly  steep  slopes  and  has  been  drained  by 
open  grips  where  necessary,  so  that  the  storm  water  has  a good 
chance  of  getting  away.  Thei*e  is  some  possibility  of  erosion, 
but  as  the  plantation  has  been  thinned  (too  much  for  overhead 
canopy)  in  order  to  encourage  undergrowth  for  the  game,  the 
grasses,  &c.,  will  not  allow  much  damage  by  washing.  The 
general  aspect  is  south.  The  principal  objects  of  the  plantation 
are  the  promotion  of  game  covert  and  ornament  to  the  hill- 
side. The  moors  above  are  bleak,  high,  peaty,  and  mostly 
unenclosed.  The  vegetation  thereon  is  heather,  bracken, 
cotton  grass,  and  sphagnum.  The  peat  in  places  covers  the 
remains  of  a former  birch  forest  which  appears  to  have  grown 
on  a thin  soil  just  covering  the  grit  stone,  at  an  altitude  of  1,600 
to  1,700  feet.1  On  other  parts  of  the  Pennines  the  writer  has 
seen  stumps  of  oak  at  1,400  feet.  It  does  not  necessarily  follow 
that  trees  would  grow  there  to-day,  even  if  the  peat  were 
drained  or  denuded.  It  may  be  that  the  climate  has  altered 
since  those  remains  were  living.  But  the  subject  has  by  no 
means  been  exhausted  in  research  and  discussion.  In  the 
doughs  and  gills  the  trees  grow  at  considerable  altitudes, 
and  in  at  least  one  situation  further  north  near  Ashgill, 
we  have  fairly  thriving  plantations  at  1,750  feet  above 
sea-level,  where  they  are  dense  enough  to  provide  natural 
shelter  to  the  individual  trees.  The  presence  of  bracken  and 
heather  is  generally  supposed  to  be  indicative  of  a soil,  &c., 
which  will  grow  trees.  The  Wyresdale  gorge  below  Abbey- 
stead  is  thickly  wooded  with  fine  oaks,  elms  and  other  trees, 
and  the  Hodder  Valley  and  others  lying  north  of  the  local  fells 
have  thriving  woods  and  plantations,  and  about  half  a mile 
above  the  valley  from  the  plantation  inspected,  Mr.  A.  Wilson, 
F.L.S.,  F.R.Met.Soc.,  reports  one  of  the  finest  lime  trees  he  has 
ever  seen,  which  again  indicates  that  shelter  is  of  more  impor- 
tance than  soil  alone.  There  is  one  point,  however,  which  must 
be  noticed.  The  mild  humus  of  the  former  forests  has  in 
places  been  replaced  by  the  acid  humus  of  the  peat  bogs,  which 
is  distinctly  unfavourable  to  tree  growth.  It  may  be  added 
that  the  millstone  grit,  where  covered  with  mild  humus  in  the 
1 The  Flora  of  Went  Lancashire , Weldon  & Wilson,  1907,  pp.  45  and  46. 
