4. German Gardening, as to planting Timber Trees and Hedges
395. Planting, as a matter of profit, has been little attended to in Germany, from the number and extent of the native forests. In some districts, however, Pomerania for example, barren sandy tracts are sown with acorns and Scotch pine-seeds, chiefly for the sake of fuel, and common husbandly timber. Much attention, as Emmerich informs us (Culture of Forests), and as appears by the number of German works on Forstwissenschaft, is in general paid to the management of forests already existing: as far as we have been able to observe, this extends to filling up vacancies by sowing, and occasionally draining and enclosing; thinning and pruning are little attended to in most districts. The oak, the beech, and the Scotch pine are the prevailing native trees of Germany. The celebrated Black Forest, in the duchy of Baden, though once covered with wood, is now for the greater part bare. Two districts of forest which still remain consist, the one chiefly of silver and spruce firs, and pines, and the other of oaks; some of the latter being of great size and age. A plantation of Pinus rubra was made in the park at Carlsruhe: the trees were in 1828 thirty years old, and forty feet high; but whether their timber is superior to that of Pinus sylvestris remains to be proved. The Quercus pedunculata and sessiliflora are here believed to be varieties of the same species, Quercus Robur. Quercus pedunculata is said to be most abundant on moist ground; for instance, on the borders of the Rhine. In the woods of Carlsruhe, which form part of the forest of Hartwald, both sorts produce equally tall, straight, sound, and durable timber. The oak grows at Carlsruhe with very great luxuriance; and it is not uncommon to find leaves from twelve to fourteen inches long, and from six to eight inches broad. A superior variety of the Pinus sylvestris is grown on the Rhine, about Rastadt, on the German, side, and near Hagenau, on that of France. Seeds are sent to various parts of Europe from seedsmen in Rastadt and Hagenau.
