Aerial View of T111 Experiment site, Teindland
Photographs courtesy of Forest Research, Newton, Elgin and John Keenleyside, Forres.
Two views (second in the large image) of the cultivation experiment in Teindland Forest, Moray which shows the pattern of cultivation plots within a boundary fence inside the forest.
During the 1970s and later there was much discussion on the merits of intensive and deep cultivation to improve the growth, stability of tree crops on a variety of sites. In this experiment extensive deep sub-soiling at + 80cms was carried out at one and two metre spacing followed by forestry ploughing turning out spaced furrows and also complete cultivation. In one other variation an attempt was made to return the out turned furrow back to its original position but with the vegetation side down.
In the attached PDF is the remainder of the written work on the experiment, all that was left in the closed file, which details the ploughs, tractors some results and later change in the experiment to include assessments of the application of nitrogen.
In the event as can be seen in the later dated remarks, the growth rates of Sitka spruce on all the treatment sites (really impoverished soils) appeared to even out in time. It was noted the largest improvements occurred with additions of fertiliser.
Many years after this work, the desire to produce reasonable growth rates of Sitka spruce on difficult and nutrient impoverished sites continued and later experiments with intimate mixed species planting combined with the Sitka spruce produced more promising results.
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Groups: Forest Research, Tractors Ploughs and Drainage Machines