. Annual report of the Cornell University Agricultural Experiment Station, Ithaca, Cornell University. Agricultural Experiment Station; Agriculture -- New York (State). 994 Rural School Leaflet. look up. You will be surprised to see how nearly the crowns of the trees fill all the space overhead. The large trees have pushed up, strug- gling to get ahead of each other and to spread their tops in the light, without which their leaves cannot digest the food neces- sary^ for further growth. The lower branches have been shaded off, and the typical forest form of tree has been developed,—long, c
. Annual report of the Cornell University Agricultural Experiment Station, Ithaca, Cornell University. Agricultural Experiment Station; Agriculture -- New York (State). 994 Rural School Leaflet. look up. You will be surprised to see how nearly the crowns of the trees fill all the space overhead. The large trees have pushed up, strug- gling to get ahead of each other and to spread their tops in the light, without which their leaves cannot digest the food neces- sary^ for further growth. The lower branches have been shaded off, and the typical forest form of tree has been developed,—long, clean^trunk, or upward stretching great branches, with narrow crown lifted high in the air. How different from the same kind of tree grown in the field! Now we come to a little opening in the overhead cover. Se\'eral 3xars ago nature, or man, took out of the forest here one or more of the adult generation and left a hole of some square rods over which is stretched the open sky. Look about a little; here are the stumps. There was no vacant space overhead when these trees were standing in full vigor. Now the spot is thick with flourishing brush. It does not look much like forest growth, but it is. These whips and bushes are struggling with one another for the light, and, therefore, the place. The bushes spread out their tops and try to choke the whips back, yet some are getting through. Once clear of the shrubs, they will shoot up fast, for then they will be racing with each other, a race for life. As their tops close together the laggards will be cut off. The shade will deepen, the stems thin out through the death of those less fit to survive, the bushes below will succumb until the undergrowth is like that of the rest of the forest. A new generation will have replaced the old. Yonder is a thicket of saplings. What stor}?- do they tell us? They grow up by twos and threes, or perhaps more, from stumps which tell of the axman's work—a forest of " sprouts " or coppice-
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