On Naval Timber and Arboriculture: With Critical Notes on Authors who have Recently Treated the Subject of Planting — John Shaqi
On Naval Timber and Arboriculture: With Critical Notes on Authors who have Recently Treated the Subject of PlantingMatthew, Patrick
Science
On Naval Timber and Arboriculture: With Critical Notes on Authors who have Recently Treated the Subject of Planting
Matthew, Patrick
Forests and forestry -- Great Britain
There are some kinds of foreign elm which deserve attention. Some time
ago we planted several of these, and lately cut down one of about
six inches diameter, which we found a great deal harder and stronger
timber than our _U. montana_. We had this kind under the name of the
Broad-leaved American. The bark was rather lighter in colour, and
smoother, than _U. montana_; the leaves were rough and large, and the
annual shoots extremely luxuriant; but, probably owing to climate,
or difference of circumstance, the exposed situation where we had it
growing being very unlike the close American forest, it did not carry
up its vigour of growing into {53} the top, although the top was
healthy, but continued throwing out numerous annual shoots, five or
six feet long, from the bulb and side of stem, which disposition we
did not succeed in correcting by pruning. This did not seem to arise
from grafting, as some of the shoots broke out higher up than the graft
must have been, and there was no difference between the lower and upper
shoots.
_U. montana_, when come to some size, on the primary branches being
lopped off, like the oak, often throws out a brush of twigs from the
stem, and these twigs impeding the transit of the sap, the brush
increases, and the stem thickens considerably, in consequence of a
warty-like deposit of wood forming at the root of the twigs. This
excrescence, when of size, after being carefully seasoned in some cool
moist place, such as the north re-entering angle of a building, exposed
to the chipping from the roof, forms a richer veneer for cabinet-work
than any other timber. This disposition to form brush and excrescence
might be given by art to almost any kind of tree, excepting the
coniferæ and beech, and might be made a source of considerable profit.
This could easily be effected by slitting, pricking, and bruising the
bark at certain periods of the season. A very beautiful waved timber
might also be formed by {54} twisting the stems of trees tight up
with round ropes, the screw circles of the rope not being quite close
to each other; the ropes to remain several seasons, then to be kept
off for a season or two, and again applied. The practice of forming
warty excrescences might be combined with that of forming wavy fibres,
with the finest effect. Of course, those trees with timber of rich
colour, and susceptible of high polish, would be the most suitable
for undergoing this process. _U. campestris_ also throws out a brush,
but from the great inferiority of the timber in beauty, and from its
unfitness for cabinet-work, it would be useless to encourage it by
art. Some plants of _montana_, not covered with brush, have a curious
unevenness (laced appearance) of the timber in the stem, which renders
it a beautiful cabinet plank.
NARROW-LEAVED OR ENGLISH ELM—_Ulmus campestris_.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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