Page:TheTreesOfGreatBritainAndIreland vol02B.djvu/259

Rh "I did not require to wait long to see the results reversed, as severe frosts in June of that same year, I think on 21st, 22nd, and 23rd, when we had 9°, 10°, and 8° of frost respectively, nearly put the Tyrolese bed out of existence, while those that had been cut earlier in the season (the home variety) did not suffer to anything like the same extent. I am now so thoroughly convinced in my own mind of the superiority of larch from home or British seed, that I have entirely discarded the Tyrolese."

Though the seed is ripened in ordinary seasons in all parts of the country, and a few self-sown trees may be found on most estates where rabbits are kept down, yet our conditions of soil and climate are so unlike those of the natural larch forests of the Alps, that it is useless to attempt natural reproduction with any economic advantage. The only cases in which I have seen any number of self-sown seedlings in the southern half of England are where a clean felling has been made of the larch, and the ground more or less broken up by hauling out the logs immediately afterwards. Of the seedlings which germinate, so large a proportion are destroyed by frost, drought, or vermin in the first season, that the number remaining is not worth consideration, and their growth is so slow for five or six years that planted trees of half the age will usually be stronger. On sandy land, however, or at high elevations, and especially in Scotland, it may sometimes be worth while to encourage self-sown trees, but I cannot say that I have ever seen even a small area which is either sufficiently or regularly stocked by self-sown larch. In the Alps, on the other hand, where the soil is covered with snow for three months or more, natural regeneration is both easy and regular, and I have, both in the French and Italian Alps, seen the ground covered with larch seedlings, which, taken up as late as May, when just uncovered by the snow, I have brought to England when a few inches high, with success. Indeed, it is wonderful how long seedlings will live if taken up when vegetation is just commencing, and sent by post in small tin boxes, tightly packed with a little damp moss or soil, and such trees are my most agreeable souvenirs of many visits to distant countries.

The manner in which the seed is collected in the French Alps is described to me as follows by M. Surel, Inspector of Forests at Briancon, a district which is celebrated for its larch forests:—"In February, before the season when the cones are ripe, we choose trees of which the cones are still closed, and spread large cloths round their trunks at about 10 feet from their base. When the cones open, the seed falls on the cloths. It is then dried in the sun, or preferably, in order to avoid excessive drying, under an open shed. The collection takes place at a minimum altitude of 5500 feet, where the snow is still frozen, and the drying of the seed by the sun, which in this district is remarkably strong, the thermometer rising in the sun in February to 30° to 32° Centigrade, is therefore carried on under very favourable conditions. Drying by the stove would give deplorable results. If I were obliged to work in a climate where the climatic conditions made our practice impossible, I should use closed rooms, slightly heated, but of which the air was freed from moisture by chloride of calcium."