Chapter XV Tree-Pruning in Economic Forestry
Where trees are grown for profit, they will, if properly managed, prune themselves, and where for ornament the natural outline is far better than any of the contortions and symmetrical shapes that have been recommended by various writers on the subject.
A broken or dead branch may be removed, a rival leading shoot cut away, or an ungainly or dangerous limb amputated, but here all pruning should cease, the practice being wholly wrong and unreasonable, and without one recommendation to be adduced in its favour. In an economic way the finest plantations of either coniferous or hard-wooded trees in this country are those where the individual specimens are growing so thickly together that the branches are killed outright for fully one-half of their height. Here the stems will be straight and clean, and the timber when converted free from the knots and warping that are so characteristic either of standard specimens or such as have been grown too thinly on the ground.
Every one knows that an Oak growing alone or along the margins of a wood is in nine cases out of ten branched almost to the ground, and the bole in consequence rough and ill-fitted for any particular constructive purpose, and the same may be said of every other tree, be it hard-wooded or coniferous. Larch and Scotch Fir trees growing along the margins of plantations are rough and knotty, and sell at a considerably lower figure compared with those further in, where the branches have been killed back gradually as the trees increased in size.
The same thing is markedly the case in young woods of ash, oak and chestnut, where they have been grown sufficiently thick on the ground to kill off the lower branches, and also to cause the trees to rise straight, clean and tapering. It is a well-known fact, too, that the timber of trees so grown is far more elastic and realizes a much higher price than that of the same age grown under conditions where pruning might have been a necessity. A case of this kind came under my own notice only a short time ago in which one-half of a plantation of hard-wooded trees realized fully one-fourth more than the remaining half. It came about in this way. Both ends and a large patch in the centre of the wood had been thinned out severely for the purpose of planting game covert. The trees, standing thinly on the ground, branched out and soon covered the open spaces where underwood had been planted. In thinning the whole plantation the trees on these particular parts were very rough and knotty, and bore no comparison to those where they had been left moderately thick on the ground, in consequence of which the boles were straight, clean and tapering. This case is specially noteworthy, inasmuch as the trees over the whole area were growing under exactly similar conditions as to soil, shelter, etc., and were of the same age and species.
Great and irreparable damage has been done to woods and plantations in this country by too heavy thinnings, by commencing the thinnings at too early a period, and by adopting the book method of leaving the trees at measured distances apart and a stated number to the acre according to the age of the plantation. Such rules can never be expected to work satisfactorily, the size of trees depending so much on the character of the soil, exposure of the woodland, and other peculiarities of the particular district in which they are planted.