Country Life An ingenious and pretty experiment in afforestation of
So- its; quite other than the large and thoughtful suggestion made last week by Mr. Llewellyn, was carried out at -Aberdare many years ago through the first Lord Aberdare, at one time Home Secretary.' He was interested in what some Commentator called " the `conversion of tips," that is to say, the changing of dark and ugly ." tips " of shale and waste coal into green and comely mounds. After many trials by an agent of gardening skill, it was discovered that an unexpected number of useful and agreeable plants took very kindly to shale, among them, rather surprisingly, some of the commonest and comeliest big trees; such as chestnut and, I think, sycamore. A list of the successful colonizing Plants; both small and great, was in my posseision a genera- tion ago, but, I regret to say, has vanished. What the experiment proved was, first, that tips need not remain plain and ugly ; second, that the neighbourhood of Aberdare is in some regards peculiarly suitable for the groWth of certain trees. One of the peculiar advantages of .affOresta- tion, as " a job of work," is that the planters Can usually be given also a certain amount of agricultural work. Nothing is more attractive in the Governinent'i afforestation scheme round Thetford and Brandon in 'Norfolk and Suffolk thin the small holdings on which the men work betweenwhiles, and on which their 'families help in the keeping of poultry and pigs and in gardening. Thus is the sum of production and the health of the family fruitfully increased.
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