In Great Britain, research in forestry and forest products has been actively pursued during the last thirty years, but it is not carried on under unified control as in some other countries. Here, research into problems of forestry is the responsibility, under the Forestry Acts, of the Forestry Commission, while research into the utilization of forest products is one of the numerous subjects dealt with by the Department of Scientific and Industrial Research. Since these two clearly-related fields of research are separately administered and since they have innumerable points of contact, a close liaison between the departments is necessary. This is, in fact, maintained.
Flags on this map show State forests in England, Scotland, and Wales.
(Photo by courtesy of the British Information Services)
The Forestry Commission, as the government department responsible for the promotion of research in forestry, proceeds in two ways: first, by maintaining a research organization to deal with the numerous practical problems which are always arising and, secondly, by giving grants to universities and other institutions with which to conduct investigations of a more fundamental character. The administration of forest research is in the hands of the Director of Research and Education, stationed in London, who is responsible to the Director-General of Forestry; the staff consists of a Chief Research Officer (ranking as Conservator) and 12 research officers, most of whom have a number of foresters and foremen to assist them.
The Chief Research Officer, who has control of all the experimental work carried out by the Commission in Great Britain, is stationed at the new Research Station at Alice Holt, near Farnham in Surrey, and all the research officers, except four who work from Edinburgh, are stationed there as well. A useful account of the development of the Commission's Research Branch can be found in their Report on Post-War Forest Policy, published in 1943.
The work is divided into the following sections - Silviculture, Mensuration, Entomology, Pathology, Ecology, and Genetics, each of which, with the exception of silviculture, is headed by an officer responsible directly to the Chief Research Officer. In silviculture, it has been necessary to divide the country on a geographical basis and make one officer responsible for the work in the southern half of Great Britain and: one (working from Edinburgh) responsible for Scotland and the north of England. This division accords reasonably well with the distribution of the types of problems which have to be faced in afforestation.
A survey of research in forestry and forest products in the United Kingdom, written for UNASYLVA by F.Y. HENDERSON, Director of Forest Products Research. Laboratory, Princes Risborough, and JAMES MACDONALD, Director of Research and Education, Forestry Commission, London
Afforestation of hillside. Experimental plantation in a State forest in Wales.
(Photo by courtesy of the British Information Services)
Silviculture
In the field of silviculture, circumstances have dictated the lines which have been followed, and the early concentration of effort by the Commission on the establishment of plantations on bare land caused the silviculturists to concern themselves mainly with problems arising out of afforestation. More recently, other problems have arisen as the plantations have developed, and it is likely, as time goes on, that the proportion of effort spent on purely afforestation problems will diminish further.
The establishment of plantations, which has formed the major part of the work in the last thirty years, has consisted in the main of dealing with problems associated with particular types of land, with peats, with upland Calluna soils, with lowland heaths, with clay soils, and with chalk downland. In each case, there has been experimental work on choice of species, on methods of soil preparation, on methods of planting, and, on the first three types at least, on manuring. In addition, work has been carried out on age and type of plant, on planting distances, and on mixtures and nurse species. Not unnaturally, most of the work has been concerned with the establishment of conifers but a considerable program of investigation has been undertaken in connection with the establishment of broadleaved species. Some of this work has been carried out on land which was not carrying or had not carried forest, but the bulk of it was developed on old woodland sites. The species principally concerned were oak, beech, ash, and sycamore, although minor trials of walnuts, both Juglans regia and Juglans nigra, have been attempted. Particular attention was paid to spacing, to the use of conifers as nurses, to the arrangement of species in mixture and to studies of the effects of weeding.
Along with these investigations into the establishment of broadleaved trees on old woodland sites, there were occasionally combined attempts at finding cheap and convenient methods of restocking these sites. Many of the old broadleaved woodland areas, largely as a result of war-time devastation and felling, are in a deplorable condition, and the acreage of derelict and devastated woodlands of this character amounts, in the aggregate, to a substantial figure. The need to regenerate them speedily is urgent and, accordingly, this project has now assumed much prominence in the program of future research work.
Experimental work with poplars, with which the pathologist has been closely associated, has been directed mainly to securing a rapid-growing and canker resistant variety. After considerable experience under British conditions the following four poplars have been selected as the most promising in the present state of our knowledge - Populus serotina, Populus serotina var. erecta, Populus, and Populus gelrica. Work with this important genus will continue and the geneticist, as well as the pathologist, will be associated with its development.
Since most of the new and restocked forest areas in Great Britain are formed by planting, the raising of the necessary stocks in nurseries is an essential link in the chain of operations, and the investigations into different aspects of nursery practice have involved a large program of research and experimental work covering the whole field of practice in the nursery. This work has resulted in numerous improvements in practice.
More recently, attention has bean paid, in particular, to two main points - the maintenance of fertility in established nurseries and the attempt to cheapen costs of establishment by raising suitable planting stock in a shorter time. With regard to the latter, considerable progress has been made in raising large one-year seedlings of numerous species by the use of composts and artificial manures and by the development of heathland nurseries. The maintenance of fertility in established nurseries, which raises deep-seated problems of nutrition, is being studied at the present time, not only by the Commission's own staff but by well-known soil scientists.
In all the experimental work, both in the forest and in the nursery, particular attention has been paid to methods of layout and to experimental design and technique in general.
Research and experimental work in silviculture engages the attention of six officers; three are stationed at Alice Holt and three at Edinburgh.
Mensuration
Organized collection of data on the growth and production of the different forest trees is a comparatively new thing in the United Kingdom. Nothing of this sort was attempted until shortly before the war of 1914-1918, a curious circumstance in view of the widespread and long-continued interest in the cultivation of a large number of species. The abnormally heavy fellings, which were made during that war, gave an exceptionally good opportunity for collecting data on a large scale all over the country, an opportunity which was seized by the Forest Authority of that time. More than 1,100 sample plots of many species, almost entirely coniferous, were then measured in all parts of the country and, based on information obtained from them, a set of Yield Tables for the principal conifers was published shortly after the end of the first war. Those tables were the best that could be produced in the circumstances, but they had their limitations. The data for the principal species, Scots pine (Pinus sylvestris), European larch (Larix decidua), and Norway spruce (Picea abies) were not inadequate, but they were obtained from crops managed on a system which, even then, was obsolescent, a system characterized by close spacing at planting and light thinnings thereafter. Newer exotics, like Sitka spruce (Picea sitchensis), Japanese larch (Larix leptolepis), and Corsican pine (Pinus nigra var. calabrica), on which the postwar afforestation so largely depended, were so poorly represented that only short provisional tables could be prepared.
In order to obtain more accurate data which could be used to improve and extend the first Yield Tables, permanent sample plots were established at an early stage, and work on these plots still continues. As has already been mentioned, these permanent plots also have a strictly silvicultural aspect in the comparative trials of thinning grades which are carried out when sets of plots are established, and they are now yielding valuable information on the production of various species under different grades of thinning. In 1928, a first revision of the Yield Tables was made possible by the accumulation of data from the permanent plots, and new tables are now in course of preparation for a number of species. The first of these, for Japanese larch, will be published shortly.
Many permanent sample plots have been established, but losses due to felling, wind, and other causes have reduced their number. At the present time, there are 387 effective plots in existence. These cover a wide range of sites, except, possibly, the poorest because the slow-growing plantations have usually not yet reached the stage when plots can be established. The principal coniferous species are reasonably well represented while, among the rarer species, plots have been formed in Pinus monticola and Picea omorika.
Although a small number of permanent plots has been established in plantations of broadleaved species, very little is known of the growth and production even of common trees like oak, beech, ash, birch, and sycamore. The reason is that, outside the State plantations, there are very few stands suitable for careful investigation of this kind. Most of the privately owned broadleaved forest is old; its silvicultural history is unrecorded; it is, in general, seriously under-stocked. In the State forests, some of which contain considerable areas of old broadleaved woodland, most of the young plantations are not yet ready for sample plot studies.
Students carrying out high pruning in an experimental plot.
(Photo by courtesy of the British Information Services)
The increment of broadleaved trees is being investigated by means of an examination of large numbers of felled trees in various parts of the country and, although this method possesses certain disadvantages, it is the best which can be adopted in the circumstances. Volume tables, for broadleaved and for coniferous species, are also in course of preparation.
A method of volume sampling on a country-wide basis, for use in connection with the Census of Woodlands, has been worked out, and investigations are proceeding into the yield in thinnings from young conifer plantations.
The heavy fellings which were necessary during the Second World War gave another opportunity of collecting data which could not have been gathered in the normal way. This work was carried out partly by members of the university staffs, financed by a grant from the Commissioners, and partly by an officer specially appointed for this purpose. The main object of this investigation was to correlate rate of growth with the different locality factors. The results are now being worked up for publication.
The officer in charge of the work on growth studies and mensuration is stationed at Alice Holt; he is assisted by another officer who is quartered in Edinburgh.
Ecology
The appointment of an officer to conduct ecological investigations from Alice Holt was one of the first measures taken in the recent postwar reorganization of forest research, and it was regarded as a step towards a fuller examination of the whole complex that constitutes a forest. As an initial task, the ecologist was given the beech to study. This tree, which has been planted in all parts of Great Britain and is a characteristic feature of certain districts, such as the chalk hills of the Chilterns and South Downs, raises some difficult silvicultural problems on which, it is felt, much light will be thrown by a proper understanding of the ecological factors.
There is one other aspect of ecological work which may be referred to. In 1938, at a meeting of the British Association, in Cambridge, the Chairman of the Forestry Commission announced that the Commission, would be prepared to set aside certain unplanted areas in their forests for the study of ecological changes and succession by experts from the various schools of botany. This offer was quickly accepted. The work was seriously interrupted by the war, but it has now recommenced, and valuable records have been prepared for eight different areas.
Genetics
The study of the genetics of forest trees, which has made remarkable progress in recent years in many countries, has now been added to the list of projects which is being undertaken by the Research Branch. An officer has recently been appointed for this purpose and a section is being equipped at Alice Holt for his investigations.
(Photo by courtesy of the British Information Services)
A wide field of activity is available but up to the present time the officer in charge has been engaged in preliminary work and in making an assessment of the more immediate problems.;
Pathology
Generally speaking, although there is a steady loss each year from tree diseases caused by fungi, there has been an absence-of attacks of great severity attributable wholly to this cause. Nevertheless there is need for constant watchfulness.
Two of the most serious diseases affect species which are not mainly forest trees; these are the elm disease (Ceratostomella), widespread in the southern parts of Great Britain, which has been under close observation for about twenty years, and the bacterial watermark disease of the cricket-bat willow (Salix alba var. caerulea), which is very serious locally.
The chestnut, an important crop in parts of southern England, is being kept under close observation owing to the appearance in Europe of the chestnut blight (Endothia). Although this disease has not occurred in England, its presence on the Continent is a matter of some concern.
In the coniferous plantations, numerous cases of damage by various fungi come up yearly for investigation and report, and much of the pathologist's time is taken up with studies of this kind. A further set of problems for the pathologist arises from instances where a fungal or bacterial agent is absent or is obviously of secondary importance and where other causes must be sought. One example of this is frost damage which is often a serious matter in Great Britain; another is drought, which in certain seasons may cause appreciable damage.
Entomology
Like pathology, entomology in Great Britain has not had to deal in recent years with widespread attacks. About forty years ago, however, there was very serious damage to European larch plantations in the west and northwest of England, the result of a widely distributed infestation of the large larch saw-fly (Pristiphora). It is possible that the peculiar climatic conditions in this country may not be generally favorable to the development of severe insect infestations; but, on the other hand, the large areas of coniferous plantations in all parts of the country, many of them of exotic species, provide a possibility for such developments if other conditions permit. The main duty of the entomologist at the present stage, is to study the insect populations in the plantations by means of regular surveys, paying attention to the status of potential pests and their parasites and predators, and to estimate the probability of outbreaks on a serious scale.
Among the insects which are being studied are the following: the bark beetles, aphids, particularly the Neomyzaphis on Sitka spruce, chafers which from time to time cause serious damage in the nursery, and sawflies on various conifers.
Mechanization
During recent years, forestry in Great Britain has become more and more mechanized, the result, partly, of the general development of mechanical equipment, but, in the main, the consequence of the rising cost of labor and the need for timely completion of large annual programs. Much of the work preparatory to planting has now been mechanized, as well as many operations in the nursery, while increasing production from the young State forests, in the form of thinnings, has raised problems in extraction and in transport which are likely to be solved only by the increased use of machines. It is rarely found that machines, designed for other purposes, can be used in the forest without some modification, and many questions crop up from time to time, to which there is no suitable mechanical answer. Accordingly, a development engineer has been appointed, to study mechanical developments in their relation to the practice of forestry, to examine selected types of operation with a view to mechanization, and to initiate any progress in this direction. This office is stationed at the Commission's headquarters in London and not at Alice Holt.
Grants for the promotion of research into forest soils have been made to various institutions over a considerable period of years. From 1921 until 1935 studies of the peat soils of the west and northwest of Scotland were made at the University of Aberdeen; in 1935, the scope of this work was enlarged by grants to the Macaulay Institute of Soil Research at Aberdeen which carried out valuable surveys.
Within recent years, grants have been made to the University of Oxford, to the Macaulay Institute, and to Rothamstead for fundamental research in forest soils. Both the Macaulay Institute and Rothamstead have been involved in the research on nursery nutrition which is now going on.
Important researches, which have had a profound effect on nursery practice, were carried out by Dr. M. C. Rayner, the expert on mycorrhiza, from 1933 until her death in 1948. These investigations were assisted by grants from the Forestry Commission.
This Committee, first appointed in 1930, advises the Commissioners on the different aspects of their Research work. Composed of leading authorities on silviculture, botany, pathology, entomology, soils, and forest products, it meets annually and carries out inspections of field experiments. The detailed work which is proceeding on the nutrition of plants in the nursery is supervised by a subcommittee under the chairmanship of Professor F. T. Brooks, F.R.S.
In Great Britain research into the utilization of forest products, as distinct from problems of forestry, is carried on at the Forest Products Research Laboratory, Princes Risborough, Bucks. The Laboratory, which is an establishment of the Department of Scientific and Industrial Research maintains close cooperation with both the Forestry Commission and the timber-using industries of the country and has a working arrangement with the Imperial Institute, London, which deals with minor forest products and certain aspects of pulping. The Laboratory also works in conjunction with the Timber Control and Raw Materials Departments of the Board of Trade and with other government departments and public bodies concerned in timber utilization, and it is represented on the appropriate committees of the British Standards Institution and those dealing, with Codes of Practice.
Standing as it does between the producing and consuming sides of the timber industry, the Laboratory may be said, broadly speaking, to be concerned with all the technological aspects of the timber of a tree from the time of its felling to the point at which it is incorporated in a manufactured product. The general fundamental research work into the properties of timber thus underlies a technological organization whose orientation is predominantly towards close utilization and conservation of supplies and, since the war, provision of substitutes for such traditional or specialized timbers as are in short supply or not available. The separation of forestry research and forest products research in the United Kingdom reflects this country's position as one with a heavy demand for imports - for while the Forestry Commission research organization is mainly concerned with problems involved in the growing of the home-grown crop, the Forest Products Research Laboratory has to do with the utilization not only of home-grown timber but also of the large number of species which must be imported. In the timber-producing countries this preoccupation with the properties of overseas species is not of prime importance. In the United Kingdom it is very important. Another factor also important in determining the orientation of the research in timber is the lack of research associations within the user industries themselves, whose fields of activity are extraordinarily diverse. The result of this is seen in the enormous mass of industrial advisory work with which the Laboratory is called upon to deal.
Abrasion machines for the testing of floors.
(Photo by courtesy of the Forest Products Research Laboratory, Princess Risborough)
The organization of the Laboratory is on the basis of two groups of specialist sections each under a coordinating officer - the biological and the engineering groups - together with the sections of Wood Chemistry, Physics, and External Relations. The sections, each comprising a team of workers in charge of a specialist, deal with research and advisory work in their own sphere. Each has its own contacts with industry, other government departments, and scientific colleagues in the United Kingdom and overseas; each carries on its own specialist advisory service and provides representatives for the various technical committees.
The general program of research includes those long-term investigations normal to all the Forest Products Laboratories, but, in addition, postwar conditions have brought a great increase in those projects concerned with the closer and more efficient utilization of wood in industry and in building and with the investigation of the properties and potentialities of many timbers new to the British market. Thus among the chief preoccupations of the Laboratory at the present time is the testing and evaluation of those colonial species likely to be useful in for warding the optimum exploitation of the colonial forests for local and export markets.
The specialist sections of the Laboratory referred to are as follows:
Wood Structure. This section deals with all questions involving anatomy and identification. It maintains the standard collection of timbers and carries out fundamental research in comparative anatomy and cellular structure. It advises on questions of uses and substitution and deals with those problems arising from the work of other sections which directly involve considerations of structure.
Seasoning and Wood Bending. Besides the technical work on kiln design and the provision of operating schedules for the seasoning of different timbers, this section deals with unorthodox methods of seasoning - e.g., radio-frequency and chemical drying - and with all problems involving moisture-content and the effects of its variations upon the size, shape, and properties of timbers used for different purposes. It has a wide advisory service to industry and carries on courses of instruction for the training of kiln operators. The Subsection of Wood Bending carries out experimental work on all aspects of solid and laminated bending and provides detailed practical information on method and on the relative suitability of different species for particular industrial uses.
The wood structure laboratory, Princes Risborough.
(Photo by courtesy of the Forest Products Research Laboratory, Princess Risborough)
Timber Mechanics. This section has to do with every aspect of the strength properties of timber, from the provision of basic data on small clear specimens to the testing of full-scale structures. This calls for investigations into the influence of defects upon the grading of large sizes, the properties and comparison of the various types of joints, and, at the present time, the problems introduced in the designing of "economy" structures.
Wood Preservation. The preservation of timber from attack by fungi or by insects involves questions of the natural durability and resistance and of the theory and practice of immunization. Laboratory tests on infestation by specific insects and fungi are carried out in the Sections of Entomology and Mycology respectively. The work on durability in the field, and on commercial-scale processes of impregnation of timber with creosote and other protective solutions, including both the chemical and the engineering aspects, are dealt with by the Section of Wood Preservation, which also carries out research, bath fundamental and applied into the properties and uses of fire retardants. Among the projects of this section are the processing of railway sleepers, telegraph and transmission poles, pitprops, and marine timbers, as well as the maintenance of "graveyard" field tests on durability in different parts of the country.
Woodworking. Much research into the principles underlying the cutting of wood in the various wood-working-machines is still required. This work, together with that of assessing the machining properties of different species for various uses, is the business of the Section of Woodworking. The advent of new and sometimes refractory timbers and of composite materials having wood as a major component has given rise to new problems for research into the materials and design of cutting edges. The relation of abrasion to structure and density is important in flooring work, and laboratory and full-scale tests provide data for the assessment of floors of maximum efficiency under different kinds of traffic. Problems concerning the disposal of sawdust and the design of charcoal kilns are also included in the program of the woodworking section.
Composite Wood. The whole range of laminated and bonded products forms the basis of the work of this section. Plywood in all its forms is the chief subject, and its problems include those of manufacture, yield, suitability of species, and durability. Research in hand also includes investigations upon larger built-up members such as laminated beams, and upon tropical testing, radio frequency heating, and "improved" woods of various types.
Mycology. This section maintains the national collection of wood-destroying fungi and carries on fundamental work as well as laboratory tests upon resistance to decay and upon the efficacy of preservatives. As timber technologists, its staff are concerned not only with those fungi which destroy wood after conversion but also with those of the standing and newly-felled tree which are likely to affect the utilizable timber. Much of the section's time is devoted to investigations in the field, particularly to outbreaks of dry rot in buildings.
Entomology. The laboratory work includes research upon the life history and physiology of wood-destroying insects, and upon the efficacy of the various insecticides used in combating pests of buildings; furniture, etc. As with the Mycologists, the work involves investigations into pests of standing or newly-felled trees - e.g., pinhole borers - both at home and in dependent territories.
Wood Chemistry. The functions of the Section of Wood Chemistry, in addition to its advisory work both within the Laboratory and outside, are twofold: research into the fundamental constitution of wood, and applied work on specific timbers, particularly colonial timbers, as sources of utilizable breakdown products.
Physics. The strength, seasoning, and behavior of timber in working are intimately related to its physical properties. The Section of Physics, like that of Chemistry, provides a background of pure science for the work of the applied sections on such aspects as wood-water relations, the diffusion of heat and gases, and: the elastic properties of timber.
External Relations. This section takes charge of the wider liaison, as distinct from sectional and individual contacts, between the Laboratory and outside bodies. As it is considered desirable that all senior officers should have a personal interest in research, the head of the Section of External Relations is normally an experienced forester with scientific qualifications who is responsible for carrying on the research and advisory work relating to forestry subjects, and particularly for co-operative work with the Forestry Commission on problems such as the effect of pruning, rate of growth, etc., upon the quality of the timber. The general arrangement of this work rests with the Director-General of the Forestry Commission and the Director of Forest Products Research, who serve upon each other's advisory bodies. On the technological side, the section collates the general research data of the Laboratory, carries out industrial studies into the better utilization of wood and the introduction of new species, and also investigates problems connected with traditional timbers now in short supply.
Its routine work includes the arrangements for dealing with visitors and with general matters of publicity; including the staging of exhibitions.
Publications and Records. Tile publication of books, bulletins, and leaflets covering the Laboratory's work and of articles in scientific journals is undertaken by this section, which also provides all the usual library facilities required by the establishment.
The organization of the Laboratory as separate specialist sections under general administrative control, rather than in larger groupings, provides a flexible disposition of resources suited both for ease of internal working and external contact. Specific enquiries are dealt with by the specialists themselves, and not through any intermediary body. This ensures a service of the best advice, quickly rendered to the enquirer, and also keeps heads of sections fully aware of scientific and industrial trends. This mode of organization also enables co-operative research projects to be easily arranged and carried out by relevant groups of sections. Thus a project, say, on the effect of toxic substances incorporated in the glue-line of a plywood upon infestation by wood-borers will involve an ad hoe co-ordination of the sections of Entomology. Composite Wood, and Wood Preservation, with the assistance of Chemistry and Wood Structure, or any other section as need may arise.
In addition to the scientific sections are the ancillary services, administrative and technical, required for the general work of the Laboratory. The whole establishment is under the administration of the Director, together with the Assistant Director and Coordinating Officers previously mentioned. The Director is responsible to the Secretary of the Department, and thus to its Advisory Council.
(Photo by courtesy of U. S. Forest Service.)
