Worcester daily spy. [volume] (Worcester [Mass.]) 1850-1888, 1872-05-01

| ChcStnut ana R1ne h-iOut1tIOna.
The rapid consumption of chestnut timber in
| this country, for railroad ties, fencing bridges
/ and buildings has made the demand greater
| than the supply, and it is worth while for land
| owners in many sections TO inquire whether
| their land can be put TO any better purpose than
| the production of chestnut trees. None of our
| forest trees grow more rapidly, and chestnut
| plantation has this great advantage, that when
once started 1t never needs replanting The
! sprouts of birch, maple and most of our forest
| trees, when the trees are cut down, do not
/ amount 10 much, but the chestnut stump sends
up sprouts which in six or eight years are fit for
| posts, and in ten or twelve years will make good
| tics. Much of the land in our mountain towns
and not little in the valleys, has become SO de
Perforated by bal management that il can be
bought for trihe-we have known it sold for a
dollar per acre-and, if planted with chestnuts,
il may be made in twelve or twenty years to be
worth fifty TO one hundred dollars per acre,
and this without any expense of cultiyating the
trees.
The land best adapted to the chestnut is
warm, dry soil, and if Astounding in rocks this
is no objection. The nuts must be planted in
the fall, for if kept in the barn all winter they
become too dry 10 terminate easily. They
should be planted about five or six feet apart
each way, and covered TO the depth of three or
four inches with leaf mould from the forest If
a little OF this mould is placed under, as well as
above the nuts, they will make all the better
start in life. Select the largest and plumpeSt
nuts for planting and place two or three in
hill to make sure of the termination of one. IL
all terminate they can be allowed to grow to-
gether till large enough TO make into posts or
rails. As the trees grow they can be thiuned
out and from plantation of one hundred acres
handsome income can be realized every year.
eight or ten years after planting. The annual
deposit of leaves will also serve to enrich the
land, so that the soil, instead of becoming ex-
hausted, as on dairy or grain farm, will be
| richer at the end than in the beginning. The
planting of forest trees is an almost untred eX-
| pertinent in the United States, but in the old
| countries of Europe it has been found exceed
| ingly profitable, and we are confident that much
| of the WORKOUT land of New England can be
| put to no better use than the raising of crop
of chestnut trees. We have said nothing of the
| harvest of chestnutS which might be secured,
and which always linda ready market.
| If the soil is not adapted to the growth of
| chestnut, then start white pine plantation.
| Pines will grow almost anywhere, and contrary
| to the general belief are easily transpanted.
| We find them growing in muck swamps and on
| dry sand, on low lands and uplands. Wherever
| thew obtain f0othod, there they grow luXuri-
| antly. In natures rotation of crops, pines
| seem to be the trees which are now having their
season. They are springing up spontaneously
| on the old, worn out hills and valleys Of New
England, giving. TO our landscapes a beautifully
| yer,iant look both in summer and winter shell
tering us from fierce winds, and filling the air
| with balSam which is rs fragrant and health
| full as was the balm of Gilead in the land of
| Canaan. With all our hearts we welcome this
| rotation of white pines, and whoever roots them
| out from the steep, rocky, exhausted pastures
| as we have seen some farmers doing, does him
self and the country a damage. The cattle
| know enough to let them alone, but some men
are SO stupid as not to think that this is The
| Great Husbandman'S mode OF renewing vir-
gin soil, and, at the same time, of giving beauty
health and comfort to the world. When our
pine forests become large and abundant we
shall look for less pulmonary disease and an
improved condition of health generally in the
community, ~There are few things in the ma
terra medca more healing than pine gum, and
seems to penetrate the whole system and give
tnew life. Invalids, when they enter a pine
| forest, leave their diseases behind them.
Pine lumber is the great staple of the lumber
| merchants, and to obtain it we are searching
the distant forests of Michigan and Minnesota.
| If we can grow it at home we SHALL save much
| costly transportation.
Pines do not grow quite so rapidly as chest
| nuts, but we often find them making three and
four feet growth in enc year, and in twenty years
a forest will quite uniformly attain hight of
thirty to forty feet, with trunks about loot in
diameter. They are coming up so spontaneously
in New England that all that is necessary to ob-
tain an abundance of pine forests is TO let nature
| have her course; but If any one wishes to start a
| pine plantation, probably the quickest mode OF
| doing it is to transplant the pine saplings which
| are so abundant and so hardy to bear trans
| planting The best time to do this is in the lat
| ter part of May or the first of June, when the
| sap seems to be flowing most vigorously and
| there is the most life in the tree.-Cor Spring
| field Republican,