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BULLETIN OF THE BUSSEY INSTITUTION. 373 
No. 32.— Facts gathered by observation and experience relat- 
ing to the White Pine (Pinus Strobus L.) By Epmunp 
Hersey, Superintendent of the Bussey Farm. 
Part I. GrowrH OF THE TREE. 
As a timber tree the white pine possesses more good qualities 
than any other tree that is a native of Massachusetts. 
First, it is easy to grow it from the seed or transplant it when 
young. 7 
Second, it will grow on a light sandy soil or on a peat meadow. 
Third, on an ordinary soil the growth is quite rapid, making 
in thirty-five years from the seed a tree large enough to be sawed 
with profit into box-boards, or coarse lumber. 
Fourth, it makes lumber that can be used to advantage for a 
great variety of purposes. 
When a pine forest is to be grown from the seed, an effort 
should be made to secure seed that is new and taken from the cone 
but a few days before the time it is wanted for planting. 
The cones containing the seeds begin to grow in June, and when 
of the size of the end of one’s finger they stop growing until the 
following year, when during the summer they grow to full size 
and perfect their seeds early in September; the first frost severe 
enough to kill squash-vines opens the cones and the seeds drop 
out; they are about the size of a parsnip seed, are very light in 
weight, and having a little wing on them, they float along through 
the air in a slightly downward direction, reaching the ground some- 
times twenty rods from the parent tree, but more frequently not 
more than from one to five rods. Soon after reaching the earth 
the little wing separates from the seed, and if the seed is to ger- 
minate it becomes partially or wholly covered with earth by a 
heavy rain, or by the pressure of the foot of a passing animal, or 
the falling leaves may furnish sufficient protection to preserve its 
vitality. When nature is permitted to carry out her own plan of 
propagating the white pine her work is more irregular than when 
assisted by man. Should the seeds leave the cones when there is 
but little force to the wind they will drop very near each other at 
no great distance from the parent tree, and the result will be that 
a hundred small trees will grow on a space not large enough for 
