Dodgeville chronicle. [volume] (Dodgeville, Wis.) 1862-current, 1874-08-14
Notes ON Forest Trees.

After the farm and garden seeds are
all in the earth, it may be well to look
about and see if there are not some other
matters which are likely to be neglected
through oversight or want of the requi-
site knowledge. There are few things
which add more to the appearance or
value of farm than a goodly supply of
ornamental and useful trees and this is
especially true in scantily-wooded re-
gions, whether upon the prairie or in
tracts long settled and denuded of their
original forests. We believe that the
scarcity of trees in either instance is
owing in great measure to the want of
practical information in regard to raising
forest trees from seed. Many persons
suppose that all our native trees ripen
their seeds in autumn, and that to talk
of raising seedlings at this season is not
we'll timed. But in this they err, because
the seeds of some of our most valuable
species of indigenous trees ripen, even in
the Northern States, between the first
and the middle of June, and these must
be sown soon after or they will fail to
terminate. The silver and red maple
and American weeping elm are we'll
known examples of this fact; and, as we
write, the seeds are coloring and show
ing early maturity. If gathered as soon
as ripe and sown under thin layer of
earth they will produce plants two or
three feet high before the seeds of close
ly-allied species will be ripe in the fall
A few weeks delay in attending to this
very trifing matter of gathering the
above-named seeds at the proper time
will cause loss of one year in the
growth of the trees; and it is to these
little delays that we may charge the
barrenness, in appearance at least, of
many country home.
The first frosts of autumn loosen the
seeds of the sugar maple, and the various
exotic species which are so extensively
planted in the streets of many of our cit
les and villages. The seeds of all these
trees, as well as those of the ash, linden,
tulip tree or whitewood, liquid amber,
and similar kinds, both indigenous and
exotic, should be preserved in and dur
ing winter and sown in early spring.
There are several good reasons for pre-
serving seeds of hardy trees in sand
through winter, instead of sowing them
in the fall, as would seem to be more in
harmony with nature, the most impor-
tant of which are: 1. Protection against
vermin of various kinds, which subsist
for portion of the year upon these
seeds. 2. If the seeds are sown in
the open, unprotected fields they are
subjected to greater degree of cold and
more frequent changes of temperature
than where they fall in the forest and are
there covered with leaves. 3. The soil
becomes very compact over and about
the seeds during the winter and spring,
thereby retarding, if not frequently pre-
venting, the growth of the young, tender
plants. That the artificial processes
practiced by our nurserymen and others
are far superior to the strictly natural
one is readily proved by the results; for
not one seed in a thousand which fall
from the parent tree in the forest grows,
while the reverse of this is true when art
steps in to aid and protect.
We call especial attention to this
point, because many writers upon arbor
culture are very particular to advise
taking nature" as a guide in raising all
kinds of trees from seed, which may, in
the abstract, be well enough; but in gen.
eral practice man might as well wait
for nature to cover him with suit of
broadcloth as to provide him with choice
fruits or trees through any strictly nat
ural process. The war of races, as ex-
hibited among both plants and animals, is
Ill suited TO supply the wants OF clVll1Zeu
man; hence the employment of art to
thwart here, and encourage there, in
order to produce the desired results.
The hard-shell nuts, like the black wal
nut, butternut and hickory, may be plant
ed as soon as they fall in autumn, where
the trees are to grow, but the safest plan
is to put them in boxes of soil or sand
and set out of doors until planting time
the following spring. The proper condi-
tions for preserving their vitality unim-
paired are low temperature and moist
ure sufficient to prevent shriveling. The
soft-shell nuts, such as acorns, beechnuts
and chestnuts, are far more difficult to
preserve than those above named: still,
if gathered as soon as they are thorough
ly mature, dried for day or two, and
then packed in boxes or barrels of pure,