Abies amabilis.—Professor John Macoun detected this species during the past summer upon many of the mountains of Vancouver’s Island where with Tsuga Pattoniana it is common above 3,000 feet over the sea level. The northern distribution of this species as well as some other British Columbia trees is still a matter of conjecture. It has not been noticed north of the Fraser River, but it is not improbable that Abies amabilis will be found to extend far to the north along some of the mountain ranges of the north-west coast.
European Larch in Massachusetts.
I N 1876 the Trustees of the Massachusetts Society for the Promotion of Agriculture offered a premium for the best plantations of not less than five acres of European Larch. The conditions of the competition were that not less than 2,700 trees should be planted to the acre, and that only poor, worn-out land, or that unfit for agricultural purposes, be used in these plantations.
The prize was to be awarded at the end of ten years. The committee appointed to award the prize were C. S. Sargent and John Lowell. The ten years having expired, this Committee lately made the following report:
Mr. James Lawrence, of Groton, and Mr. J. D. W. French, of North Andover, made plantations during the spring of 1877 in competition for this prize. Mr. Lawrence, however, at the end of one year withdrew from the contest, and Mr. French is the only competitor. Your Committee have visited his plantation at different times during the past ten years, and have now made their final inspection. The plantation occupies a steep slope facing the South and covered with a thin coating of gravelly loam largely mixed towards the bottom of the hill with light sand. This field in 1877 was a fair sample of much of the hillside pasture land of the eastern part of the State. It had been early cleared, no doubt, of trees, and the light surface soil practically exhausted by cultivation. It was then used as a pasture, producing nothing but the scantiest growth of native Grasses and Sedges with a few stunted Pitch Pines. Land of this character has no value for tillage, and has practically little value for pasturage. Upon five acres of this land Mr. French planted fifteen thousand European Larch. The trees were one foot high, and were set in the sod four feet apart each way, except along the boundary of the field, where the plantation was made somewhat thicker. The cost of the plantation, as furnished by Mr. French, has been as follows:
| 15,000 Larch (imported), | $108 50 |
| Fencing, | 20 81 |
| Surveying, | 6 00 |
| Labor, | 104 69 |
| ——— | |
| Total, | $240 00 |
This, with compound interest at five per cent. for ten years, makes the entire cost to date of the plantation of five acres, $390.90.
The Trees for several years grew slowly and not very satisfactorily. Several lost their leaders, and in various parts of the plantation small blocks failed entirely. The trees, however, have greatly improved during the last four years, and the entire surface of the ground is now, with one or two insignificant exceptions, sufficiently covered. There appear to be from 10,000 to 12,000 larch trees now growing on the five acres. The largest tree measured is 25 feet high, with a trunk 26 inches in circumference at the ground, There are several specimens of this size at least, and it is believed that all the trees, including many which have not yet commenced to grow rapidly or which have been overcrowded and stunted by their more vigorous neighbors, will average 12 feet in height, with trunks 10 to 12 inches in circumference at the ground. Many individuals have increased over four feet in height during the present year. It is interesting to note as an indication of what Massachusetts soil of poor quality is capable of producing, that various native trees have appeared spontaneously in the plantation since animals were excluded from this field. Among these are White Pines 6 to 8 feet high, Pitch Pines 14 feet high, a White Oak 15 feet high and a Gray Birch 17 feet high. The Trustees offered this prize in the belief that it would cause a plantation to be made capable of demonstrating that unproductive lands in this State could be cheaply covered with trees, and the result of Mr. French’s experiment seems to be conclusive in this respect. It has shown that the European Larch can be grown rapidly and cheaply in this climate upon very poor soil, but it seems to us to have failed to show that this tree has advantages for general economic planting in this State which are not possessed in an equal degree by some of our native trees. Land which will produce a crop of Larch will produce in the same time at least a crop of white pine. There can be no comparison in the value of these two trees in Massachusetts. The White Pine is more easily transplanted than the Larch, it grows with equal and perhaps greater rapidity, and it produces material for which there is an assured and increasing demand. The White Pine, moreover, has so far escaped serious attacks of insects and dangerous fungoid diseases which now threaten to exterminate in different parts of Europe extensive plantations of Larch.
Your Committee find that Mr. French has complied with all the requirements of the competition: they recommend that the premium of one thousand dollars be paid to him.