On Naval Timber and Arboriculture / With Critical Notes on Authors who have Recently Treated the Subject of Planting

by Patrick Matthew

I. THE FORESTER’S GUIDE, by Mr Monteath.

This volume is the work of a man of some experience, and of considerable observation and ingenuity, not much assisted by botanical or physiological science or literary attainment, which he, indeed, disclaims. His principal forte, and what he seems to have been most engaged with, is oak-coppice—his besetting sin, cutting and cropping. His directions on rearing and cutting coppice may be sensible;—those who wish to practise the sacrilege of destroying young oak-forest, we refer to him, as we have always had a horror at seeing a beautiful sapling untimeously cut down, like an American bullock for its hide. At present, and while peace continues, it is very easy to obtain plenty of foreign bark, and also oak-timber, for consumption, at a very cheap rate, for this reason—and also, because, in the event of war, the price of these articles would be nearly doubled—we would request the holders of coppice, and, indeed, of all growing oak-timber, to pause in their operations of cutting, and not to sacrifice their property so unprofitably, to their own ultimate disadvantage, and also to the detriment of {141} the national resources; but immediately to set about converting their coppice-hags into oak-forest, by careful thinning and selection. For performing this, we refer them to Mr Monteath in person, who seems to comprehend the utility, and to be pretty well versed in the practice, of thinning; only we would desire him, in pruning, to attend to the functions of the leaves; that the more abundant the covering of healthy foliage, the tree will progress the faster; and that the repeated cutting down of a young plant, year after year, as he recommends, even sometimes extending it to five years in succession, will either destroy the plant altogether, or be extremely injurious to its growth: although, if the plant be stunted, cutting it down, once, as every body knows, is the plan which should be adopted with all kinds of our common forest trees—the coniferæ, beech, and birch, excepted.

Mr Monteath advises a naturalization of young plants, after they are got from nurseries, in a soil and climate similar to that which they are ultimately to occupy. We see no necessity for this. All that is required in a young plant, is, that it be of good variety, of firm fibre, in a healthy growing state; with a stout stem, in proportion to the height, {142} with numerous side branches, and with a root rather large in comparison to the part above ground.

Our author’s mode of preparation of turfy peat-moss soils for planting we think good, but conveniently applicable in heathy moss ground, only with the assistance of the late Mr Finlayson’s ingenious device of the self-clearing plough. At every seven feet of breadth, Mr Monteath excavates a deep rut, by means of a plough with three coulters and two mould-boards,—two of the coulters cutting, each, a side of the rut, the other dividing it in the middle, and the double mould-board turning out a furrow to each side. He passes this plough twice along in forming the rut, each time turning out from four to six inches in depth, so that the whole depth of the rut is about ten inches. These minor drains communicate with larger ones dug by the spade across the field. The thrown up slices are then cut into lengths of eighteen inches, and carefully dried, by turning and by piling a few together, as openly as possible, that the wind may blow through. A small pile, about six in number, is then burnt upon the intended site of each tree, if necessary, aided in the combustion by furze or other fuel; taking care, by proper regulation of the quantity of fuel, or otherwise, to prevent the combustion from proceeding too {143} far, and the ashes from becoming white and light, as in this case a considerable part of their virtues is dissipated. This ploughing, drying, and burning, being performed as early in the summer as the weather will permit, the earth under the ashes is immediately dug over, from two to four feet in breadth, and mixed with the ashes, and the following spring the planting is performed. In situations where Mr Monteath’s plough could not be worked to advantage, these minor drains may be formed by the spade; and in heathy peat soils, not requiring drains, the burning of the heathy turfs on the site of the plants might be efficacious in correcting the tannin, and in reducing and enriching the soil within the immediate reach of the young plant, which would thus acquire strength to subdue the more distant part, and gradually reduce and form the whole into soil capable of affording healthy nourishment.

We also approve of the plan mentioned by Mr Monteath, for covering with timber, rocks or stony ground, so bare of soil as not to admit of planting, by means of placing seeds in the crevices, or on the shelves of the rock, and scraping together a little mould to cover them; or, when practicable, placing the seeds in the middle of the mould. Here, however, we think he errs, in recommending the {144} cutting down of the young resulting shoot, year after year, that the plant may acquire long roots, extended down the crevices, to give the future stem stability and sufficient foraging. We would never cut down but when the plant appeared stunted, and not then in succession, nearer than three or four years from the last cutting. Those who possess rocky precipices, so steep or inaccessible that the above method of our author could not be practised with conveniency, may cause a quantity of the cheapest seeds of trees be sown down over the top of the crags during the winter: we would prefer the end of January, as the mouldering effects of the frost and the rains would cover numbers of these, so as they would come to vegetate.

Mr Monteath advises, in rearing oak-forest or copse, to put in only about thirty plants per acre, and by layers from these to cover the interstices. In order to recommend this practice, he states the celerity with which these could be extended, layer beyond layer, making steps, every second season, of eight or nine feet, by relaying the last layer’s shoots, and he affirms, that a forest could be sooner, and more economically raised by this means, than by planting the whole at first. This is sufficiently imaginative. He seems not to be aware of the fact, that life is {145} very languid, and growth slow, in any branch horizontally extended, especially when upright stems from the same root are suffered to remain. He also expects the layer-roots to become strong and capable to forage for large trees. That they will, in the oak, ever become so, we think very improbable. Examination of the roots which proceed from oak-layers would place this beyond dispute; if they are, as we presume, fibrous and slender, similar to those produced by apple-layers, no tree or bush of any great size will result. Large trees, generally, cannot be procured by layers, but only in those semiaquatic kinds which grow readily by slips. Whether it may be advantageous to fill up the vacancies of copse by layers, in preference to seed-plants, experience only can determine. The bark of trees or bushes raised by layers or cuttings is generally thicker than that of those raised from seed:—this might balance some deficiency of the growth in the case of oak-coppice.

Our author advises the cutting off the upper part of spruce-trees on the outside of plantations, in order that their lower branches may extend the more, and remain vigorous,—thence affording more adequate shelter to the within plantation. Perhaps it is quite unnecessary to guard any person from practising this piece of folly. On the outside of woods, spruce-firs {146} will retain the branches in vigour, sufficiently low for all the purposes of shelter: nothing could be more unseemly than the decapitated trees; and in a few years most of them would become rotted in the stem, die, and fall down.

From observing, on the western side of Scotland, thriving plantations exposed to south-west winds and sea-spray, and also to north-east winds and sea-spray, in woods extending along the western side of the salt lochs in Argyllshire, our author predicts, that, under his panacea of repeated cutting down, trees would grow luxuriantly in exposed situations on the north-eastern margin of our island. We do not desire to see Mr Monteath’s sanguine hope turned to disappointment, which a trial would certainly effect. There is something peculiarly hard and cutting in our vernal north-eastern breeze fresh from ocean, which withers up the tender spreading leaves of every plant raised from the ground, and placed in its immediate draught. This is occasioned as well by a cold moist, as by a cold dry wind, the new vegetable structure in the developing process, when the tissues of tubes and cells are only in the state of pulp, and all the molecular germs floating into figure, under the direction of vital and chemical impulses and attractions, being very susceptible {147} of derangement. We attribute this effect on vegetables principally to the coldness and saline matter. The depressing effect on the spirits or vital energy of man, occasioned by the eastern breeze, does not appear to be dependent on the same cause. The great rivers, the Rhine, the Weser, the Elbe, independent of the English rivers, throw a great quantity of decaying vegetable matter into the lower part of the German sea, which, being there only a shallow muddy gulf, may thence have its waters so far contaminated as to throw off pernicious exhalations. Or, what is much more probable, the eastern breeze, sweeping along the swamps (at this time in high evaporation, of malaria) which extend from Holland upward, and along the whole southern shore of the Baltic, and thence eastward nobody knows how far, must bear these exhalations, uncorrected, over the narrow sea which intervenes between these flats and our shores. It is even likely that a slight diffusion of saline matter from this gulf, instead of correcting, may have the opposite effect, as a small quantity of salt tends to promote putrefaction. It is evident that this miasma-atmosphere, borne across the German sea, is not pernicious to vegetables; as, when the breeze is not too cold, or too violent, they progress rapidly in growth, {148} and acquire a deep green colour: and, on the north-eastern Scotch coast, where timber suffers most, the breeze has little of that depressive influence on man, although it may derange his respiratory and transpiratory organs; while down on the shores of Suffolk and Essex, where the malaria of the breeze is greatest to man, the exposed trees receive less injury. Yet something may depend upon the electric state of this air, or upon the greater pressure of the atmosphere, which, we believe, are connected. On the exposed east coast, when it is desired to grow timber, we must estimate the most enduring kind of tree, perhaps sycamore plane, and place it to seaward, covering it as much as possible by wall, and planting other kinds under its lee. We have noticed several instances where timber throve well, without shelter, close by the sea, on our north-east coast, which we attributed to a diminished draught of the eastern breeze, owing to the configuration of the adjacent higher country.

Mr Monteath ascribes the sickliness and decay which, in many places, is perceptible in the timber of narrow belts, to the want of shelter, and recommends to form belts wider. There is some truth in this, and the advice is good, although he does not seem to be aware of the whole cause of the evil. {149} Trees in single rows thrive latterly much better than in narrow belts, because, from the planting, they are habituated to open situation, and acquire roots, branches, and stem, suited to this: whereas trees in narrow belts, from being in a thicket while young, acquire great length of stem, and roots and tops unproportionably small; and, when thinned out, and from the narrowness of the belt, exposed nearly as much, as, though in single row, they become sickly, from delicacy of constitution unsuited to this exposure, and from deficiency of roots to draw moisture commensurate to the increased evaporation. To obviate this evil, resulting from narrow belts, timely thinning, so as to retain numerous side-branches downward to the ground, of course, should be adopted. In a drier climate, or in high and exposed situation, continued forest will have great effect in promoting the luxuriance and health of timber; but in the southern part of Scotland, there are few situations, keeping away from high elevation and the eastern coast, where any of our common trees would prosper in forest, which would not grow pretty well singly, provided the plant be allowed from the first to accommodate its figure to the situation.

Mr Monteath’s system of pruning severely while {150} the trees are young, we think very prejudicial; and his restricting pruning to trees under 15 or 20 feet in height, equally erroneous. About 15 years ago, we selected a number of young trees several years planted, and low and bushy, in an open situation. We treated one half of these in a manner similar to what our author inculcates, pruning away most of the lower branches, and also any irregular top ones: and the other portion, though very bushy, we left to nature’s own discretion, merely correcting several which threw up more than one leader. The result has been, that those much pruned up have required constant attention to the top and repeated pruning, they continuing to break forth into irregular branches and numerous leaders, and thence have sustained considerable loss of growth; while those let alone, after hanging several years in bush fashion, of their own accord have thrown up fine leaders, which now form beautiful, upright stems, with sufficiency of regular lateral branches or feeders, requiring little or no attention; while the original bush at the ground, from the size and overshadowing of the superior tree, appears now so diminutive as to be unworthy of notice. We do not mean to inculcate that pruning is superfluous; on the contrary, when judiciously executed, under regulation of the purpose for which the {151} particular kind of timber may be required, it is highly useful: but the cutting off and diminishing the number of lower feeders, thence deterring the growth of the tree, and encouraging the superior feeders to push up as leaders; or to increase in size so as to render their removal, should it be necessary, dangerous to the health of the tree, and the upper part of the stem useless from large knots (a practice which in nine cases out of ten is followed), cannot be sufficiently reprobated. In pruning, every means should be taken to increase the number of feeders, in order that none of them may become too large; and no healthy regular feeder should be lopped off till the tree has reached the required height of stem, and a sufficient top above this for the purpose of growth; at which time the feeders upon the stem, as far up as this necessary height, may be removed[36].