16 NOVEMBER 1951, Page 26

Biological Heresy But 2,000 acres have been lost to biological

heresy. How so ?

Because monocultural coniferous plantations have so dense a canopy as to exclude sunlight from their floors, starve out the ground-flora and prevent natural self-regeneration. The carpet of fir-needles also gives "an acid surface layer" (I quote from the Quain Professor of Botany at London University) forming mar soil that banishes earthworms, nitrates and soil-bacteria. Hence, wind and water-erosion "follow the exposure of the ground on clear-felling," especially, of course, on slopes. The Commission does not exclusively plant homogeneous larch and spruce. But the bulk of Its stands is of this industrial type, not only an alien and so disharmonious intrusion, but radically offending against biological and ecological law.