Page:Cyclopaedia, Chambers - Supplement, Volume 2.djvu/786

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-According to 'the 'profits of the Underwood, the thicknefs of the itandiird-trees are to be regulated, for as they Hand more or ,lefs thick, they more or Ids injure the Undenoood. It is arllo to he conlidered at what growth the Underwood is to be fold. The taller and larger the Underwood of a coppice in general • is, the more profitable will it be for firing, and all other ufes, and the ftandards will be the better for its being left to grow to a, proper height, for their- bodies will be always, unlefs very

. great accidents occur, carried up ftrait as tar as they are ihaded by the Coppice- Wood.

A deep foil makes the fhrubs as well as trees grow more vigo- roufly than any other, and they will be fooner fit for cutting in fuch places. The perfon who owns thefe Woods muff, con- trive to cut down only a certain quantity of them every year, and regulate this fo that he may have a Constant fucceifion of a like quantity ; that part of the Wood, which was firft felled, may be grown up to its fize for felling again by that time the laft is cut. This is, in different places, to be calculated to all the various numbers between eight years and twenty or thirty.

The cutting Wood feldom yields the more and the better tim- ber ; but the cutting it oftener has greater advantages, in that it makes it grow thicker, and gives the feedlings time to come up. If many timber-trees grow in the coppice, and are to be cut down, they and the Underwood mould be felled to- gether, cutting of! the flumps as clofe to the ground as may be, in the trees, and in the fhrubs and Underwood the flumps fhould be left about half a foot high, and cut flantiiig and very fmooth.

Sawing is the beft method of felling timber-trees ; but it fome- times kills the root ; and if this is obferved to be the cafe in the coppice, no new fhoots arifing from the root, then it is pro- per to flub up the root, that it may not unneceffarily encum- ber the ground, that the other young plants may have the be- nefit of it.

In the firlt raifing -of coppices from feed, the ground muff be prepared by good tillage, as much as if it were intended for corn. The feeds of the feveral trees are to he fown in February, and if the foil be fhallow, the ground fhould be plowed into great ridges ; this will make the foil lie the thicker upon the top of each ridge, by which means the roots will have more depth to run to for nourifhmenr, and in a few years the furrows will be filled up to the level of the reft with the dead leaves, and thefe, as they rot at the bottom, will make a kind of foil, through which the young roots will fpread, and be conduced from one ridge to another, and fo the whole ground will be occu-

. pied by them. If the coppice be to be raifed on the fide of a hill, plow the ridges crofs-way of the defcent of the hill, that the water may be detained among them, and not fuffercd to runoff, as itotherwife would, by the furrows ; but if it hap- pen that the ground be over-wet, which is more rarely the cafe, then the contrary method is to be obferved, and the fur- rows plowed deep and ftrait downards, that all the water may be carried off by them, as by fo many trenches or drains. Some fow a crop of corn along with the feeds of the Under- wood, for the advantage of the firft year ; but as the feafon of fowing the feeds of the trees, is too late for the fowing the corn, it feldom turns to much advantage. It is better to fow the trees alone, and keep them well weeded the two firft years ; after which they are ftrong enough to take care of them- fclves againft fuch enemies.

In very barren ground, where the young trees can hardly fland the heat in fummer, it is proper, after fowing them, to fcatter a quantity of furze-feed over the land j the furze will grow quick, and over-top the trees at firft, but it will ferve as a guard to them at this time, defending them from injuries, and keeping the ground moift about their roots. In a few years the trees will grow up beyond thefe bufhes, and they will then foon deftroy them by their dropping. In the raifing of coppices, the nearefl difhmce for the planta- tions ought to be five foot for the Underwood ; but as to what number, and fcantlings of timber are to be left on each acre, the fhtutes in this cafe direct; but it is an ordinary cop- pice, which will not afford three or four firfts, fourteen feconds, twelve thirds, and eight wavers, according to which propor- tion the fizes of young trees in coppices are to fucceed one another. In coppice or Underwood felled at twenty-four years growth, there are to be left twelve ftore-oaks upon every aCre, or, in defe£t of them, the fame number of elms beech or afh; thefe are to be ftrait-bodied trees, and are to be left till they are ten inches in diameter, at a yard from the ground ; but it is better for the owner to have a much greater number of timber-trees, cfpecially in places where Underwood is cheap; and as to the felling, it is always necefiary to begin regularly with one fide, that the carriages, necefiary to the taking offthe Wood, may come on without injury to the reft : and in large Woods, a cart-way fhould always be left in the middle, quite through the Wood. The timber of the Underwood may be cut from the month of October to February ; but the laft month is greatly the beft, in places where there is but a fmall


 * quantity to be felled, and it can all be got down before the

fpring is too much advanced. All the Wood fhould be carried out by midfummer, and made up by April at the Iateft ; for when the rows and brufh lis longer than this unmade up, and

WOO

unbound, many of the fhoots and feedlings are fooiled by them. It is always worth the owners whole to indole the coppice well the winter before felling, to keep out the cattle, which would elfe greatly damage thiTl'upply from the feedlings and young fhoots.

New-weaned calves are tire leaft prejudicial to newly-cut Woods of any creatures, and may be put in where there is much grafs ; the next in harmlefsnefs to thefe are young colts, which, at about a.year old, may be put in to feed in the fame manner ; but about May they mtift all be put out. If the Woods happen to be cropped by cattle, it is beft to cut them up, and they will make new moots ; for that which has been bitten by the cattle, will not grow for feveral years in any degree.

If cOppice-/FWr are too thin, this is to be remedied by layin"- down the longed and fmalleft moots of thofe fhrubs or trees which are the moll advantageous, in the place, or of fuch as are neareft the bare place ; thefe will each fend forth a great ■number of fuckers, and the whole Wood will be thickened as much as defired in a very little time. Mortimer's Hufbandry vol. .2. p.. 64. WooD-Caterpillars, in natural hiftory, the name of a genus of caterpillars which does not live in the manner of others on leaves of trees or plants, or open to our obfervation, but is, as it were, buried alive under the bark, in the trunk and branches, and in the roots of trees, andfometimes in the body of fruits. ■*

Thefe are eafily diftinguifiied from thofe worms and maggots which are found in roots and fruits, and owe their origin to flies of another kind ; but they are fubjea to be confounded with another fort of animals, called by Mr. Reaumur, falfe or bajlard caterpillars, which carry a great refemblance in their figure to the real caterpillars, but which have more le»s than any of the true ones have, and are finally transformed into four-winged flies, which are not true butterflies. The butterflies, which are the parents of thofe caterpillars which live immured in trees or fruits, lay their eggs on the furface, and the young caterpillars, when hatched, eat their way in ; and doubtlefs inftiiift direfls the parent to depofit its eggs only on fuch fubftances as will fupply a proper nutriment to the young. It is no wonder that we do not find, on the out- fide of a fruit, the hole by which this creature has made its way in ; it enters while (o fmall, that the orifice that admits it is fcarce vifible, and this probably afterwards clofes up. What appears fomewhat furprifing, however, in this, is, that there ufually is only one caterpillar in a fruit, which is large enough to afford food to a large number ; and if there are fome- times found two creatures within, one is ufually a caterpillar, the other a worm of fome other kind. The whole occafion of which is, that the operation of penetrating into the fruit, is fo difficult to the young animal, that it feldom fucceeds in it ; and though the butterfly depofits many eggs on each fruit, and thefe all hatch, yet it is only here and there one on a fruit that can find the way into it.

Thefe creatures, when once lodged in their prifon, have no- thing to do but to eat up the fubftances which inclofe them, leaving the outer hard fhell unhurt, which ft ill ferves as a cafe for them ; this is a very frequent cafe in the grains of corn, where the farinaceous fubftance ferves as aliment, and the hard outer (kin becomes a firm hollow cafe afterwards for the ani- mal. The farinaceous fubftance in this cafe ufually proves enough for the animal in its caterpillar fate ; but if it does not, the creature has recourfe to a very lingular expedient; it eats again its own excrements, and finds its now ftronger ftomach able to feparate nourifhment from that very matter, which had before paffed off from its weaker ftomach undigefted. Of thefe fpecies of caterpillars, fome go out of their prifon in order to change into their chryfalis, and thence into their but- terfly-fhte; but the greater number remain there, and pafs through all their changes within.

The little caterpillar, which has eaten all the farinaceous fub- ftance of a grain of barley, and is to remain in the fhell to change into a chryfalis, covers over the whole inner cavity of the feed with a web of her own filk, and then feparates it by a divilion, made of the fame matter, into two cells of dif- ferent fizes ; the longeft of thefe is for itfelf in the chryfalis- ftate, and the fmaller for its excrements, which it takes great care to keep out of its own habitation : when it enters into the butterfly-ftate, it makes its way out of the prifon through a, round hole, which is made through the rind of the grain, and is, till that time, flopped with a nice valve. This is a precaution the caterpillar takes while it is growing, that it may not die a prifoner when it arrives at its winged- ftate, in which it has no inftruments for making its way out. It is always the deftruftion of a grain of corn to have one of thefe creatures in it ; and it fares not much better with the larger fruits : in thefe, though the caterpillar cats only a fmall part of the fruit, yet it deftroys the organization of the whole, and frequently fo entirely fpoils the courfe of its growth, that it falls off the tree.

Thefe caterpillars, like all the other kinds, have certain ffefh- eating worms, whofe parents are of the fly-kind, for their ter- rible enemies and deftroyers ; and it is not unfrequent, on opening one of thefe fpoiled fruits, inftead of the expefled ca- terpillar,