29 
The Scotch Pine, Its Value for Economic Use, and for Timber-Belt 
Planting. 
The Scotch Pine is adapted to all dry soils, rich or poor; it endures 
great extremes of drought, heat and cold ; and in rapidity of growth it 
is only exceeded by the European Larch. The value of the timber 
for economic use ranks next to the wood of the White Pine. On ac- 
count of these qualities, and the small per centage of loss in trans- 
planting, the Scotch Pine ranks as one of the most valuable EVer- 
greens for planting, for wind-breaks, screens, and timber-belts, for 
shelter for live stock, farm crops, hot-beds, gardens, and orcliards. 
Sargent, in referring to the growth of the different species of trees, 
in his statement of J. S. Fay’s experiments in forest-tree planting, 
says : 
“ Scotch Pines transplanted from the Nursery in 1853, are now forty feet high, 
and from ten to twelve inches in diameter at one foot from the ground. Trees of 
the Scotch Pino raised from the seed planted in 186 1, where the trees have grown, 
but in favorable situations, and which have been properly thinned, have been cut this 
winter, and measure thirty feet in height and ten inches in diameter, one foot from 
the ground, while the average of the trees in a large plantation of Scotch Pine, made 
in the same manner in 1862, and which received no spocial care, K twenty feet 
high, and six inches in diameter.” 
After referring to the value of the wood of the Scotch Pine for fuel 
the same author says : 
“ But fuel is the least valuable use to which the wood of the Scotch Pine ca-n be 
turned. In Plurope the lymber of this pine is considered more valuable than that ol 
any other coniferous tree, the Larch excepted, and for all economic purposes it is 
rated far above American White Pine. 
“The nature of these two woods and the uses to which they are each especially 
adapted, are so dissimilar that any comparison is not particularly interesting. A 
number of experiments made at the Royal Woolwich Dock Yard have shown that 
the wood of the Scotch Pine will resist a traverse strain, 1 1 times greater than that 
of the White Pine ; that its resistance to a tensile strain is about twice as great, and 
its resistance to a vertical strain is ,56 greater ; while its specific gravity is $41 to 
5*3 fot *1*6 White Pine. All European writers — Duhamal to Laslet — agree that 
the wood of the Scotch Pine is the most durable pine wood.” 
The same writer quotes Newland’s as saying: 
" The lightness and stiffness of the Scotch Pine render it superior to any other 
kinds of timber for beams, girders, joists, rafters, and indeed for framing in general.” 
^Sargent further says : 
" From its greater strength, spars, top-masts, and the masts of small vessels 
which are often subjected to violent and sudden shocks, are made from the Scotch 
Pine in preference to any other wood, although on account of its greater lightness 
the White Pine is preferred for heavy masts and large spars. Since the supply of 
Larch has become entirely inadequate to the demand, the Scotch Pine is used in 
Europe for railroad sleepers more generally than any other tree, enormous quantities 
even being shipped froih the northern ports to India for this purpose ; although 
the wood of the White Pine is undoubtedly superior to the Scotch Pine for all pur- 
poses where a soft, light, easily worked, clear wood is demanded, the latter has quali- 
ties so desirable that its cultivation lor economic purposes would be of great value — 
especially when it is remembered that it will grow in situations where the White 
Pine will not flourish.” 
