Romans. Ray states, Synopsis, 230, published in 1690, that the sycamore was then planted in cemeteries and about the houses of the nobility, and that it was nowhere wild in England. It would appear from this that it was by no means a common tree in Britain in the seventeenth century.(A.H.)
Cultivation
The sycamore, or plane as it is commonly called in Scotland, is a tree which thrives in almost any dry soil, and seems to reach its greatest size or perfection in the colder hilly parts of England and Scotland, where nearly all the finest specimens we know of are to be found. In the Cotswold hills it is the only tree, except the wych-elm and the beech, which attains a maximum of size, and even here there are none quite equal to some trees in Scotland.
It is absolutely unaffected by the severest frosts’ at any season, and is rarely attacked by insects or fungoid diseases, ripens seed profusely almost every year, and reproduces itself almost everywhere with such ease that in my own district I believe it might overrun the country if allowed to do so. It grows rapidly when young, and, though not usually planted as a forest tree, is well suited to produce timber in windy situations, where more valuable trees will only languish. Its foliage in spring and summer is very handsome, but assumes a dirty and ragged aspect in autumn, especially in smoky districts, and therefore it is not suitable for town planting. It does not grow so well, or live so long on sand, gravel, or on heavy clay as on limestone. Its branching habit makes careful pruning or close crowding necessary if clean tall stems are desired, and as its timber is most valuable in the form of clean boles of considerable girth, it must be looked on as of some- what uncertain economic value as a forest tree. But I have found the sycamore a very useful tree for filling up blanks in thin woods, where, when once established, it grows on dry soil at least twice as fast as the ash, and four or five times as fast as the oak.
No tree can be raised from seed more cheaply and easily than the syca- more, and grafting or budding is only resorted to in the case of varieties. The seed falls in the late autumn and winter, and grows in abundance in gravel paths, so that when only a few are wanted, self-sown seedlings can usually be obtained. The seed germinates very early, often in February, though if kept dry it should not be sown before March. It is very liable to be smothered by grass in the first year, and is so easy to transplant that it will be found better to move self-sown seedlings at a year old to the nursery.
In the spring of 1900 I found great quantities of young plants recently germinated on the top of a bare hill pasture, where I wished to renew a clump of trees forming a conspicuous landmark, and had a fence put round them, in order to protect the seedlings from rabbits and cattle; but in the summer I found that every one had been suppressed by grass. In the following year I sowed sycamore seeds with many other tree seeds in lines in cultivated soil, where I
1 According to Lord Leicester it is on the coast of Norfolk the hardiest tree, except Quercus Ilex, which bears better the force of the gales from the sea.—(A. H.)
