The Woodlands of England. 
THE WOODLANDS OF ENGLAND, 
BY 
C. E. Moss, D.Sc. (Mane.), 
Curator of the University Herbarium, Cambridge ; 
W. M. Rankin, M.Sc. (Leeds), 
Storey Institute, Lancaster; 
AND 
A. G. Tansley, M.A., 
University Lecturer in Botany, Cambridge. 
Introduction. 
f \HE present paper is an attempt to deal, in a general way, with 
: the character and distribution of the different types of 
natural and semi-natural woodland in England. It is a direct out¬ 
come of the work of the Central Committee for the Survey and 
Study of British Vegetation, formed at the end of 1904, 1 with the 
object of bringing into intimate association the various workers 
engaged in active study in the field of the nature and distribution 
of British vegetation. 
Before passing on to our special subject it will be useful to 
deal quite shortly with the method of vegetation study and repre¬ 
sentation adopted by the Committee in what they term “ primary ” 
survey of vegetation, and also with certain objections to this method 
of treating vegetation, which may perhaps be entertained in some 
quarters. 
The method of primary survey employed by the Committee 
was originally adapted by the late Robert Smith, of Dundee, 2 from 
the system of cartography worked out by that acute plant- 
geographer, Professor Flahault of Montpellier, 3 whose pupil 
Smith was. A limited area of the country, either a natural physio¬ 
graphic region, or an area corresponding with one or more sheets 
of the “ one-inch ” Ordnance Survey map (1 : 63,360), having been 
selected for survey, the different types of natural and semi-natural 
vegetation, and also the “ artificial ” types, such as farmland, 
plantations, and parks, occurring within the area, are distinguished 
1 New Phytologist, IV., 1905, p. 23. 
2 Botanical Survey of Scotland : I., Edinburgh district. Scottish 
Geogr. Mag., 1900. 
5 Ch. Flahault, Essai d’une carte botanique et forestiere, etc., 
Ann, de Geogr., 1891, 
