Produced by Marilynda Fraser-Cunliffe, E. Grimo, Janet
Blenkinship, Jeannie Howse and the Online Distributed
Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net
+------------------------------------------------------------------------+
|DISCLAIMER |
| |
|The articles published in the Annual Reports of the Northern Nut Growers|
|Association are the findings and thoughts solely of the authors and are |
|not to be construed as an endorsement by the Northern Nut Growers |
|Association, its board of directors, or its members. No endorsement is |
|intended for products mentioned, nor is criticism meant for products not|
|mentioned. The laws and recommendations for pesticide application may |
|have changed since the articles were written. It is always the pesticide|
|applicator's responsibility, by law, to read and follow all current |
|label directions for the specific pesticide being used. The discussion |
|of specific nut tree cultivars and of specific techniques to grow nut |
|trees that might have been successful in one area and at a particular |
|time is not a guarantee that similar results will occur elsewhere. |
| |
+------------------------------------------------------------------------+
NORTHERN NUT GROWERS ASSOCIATION
REPORT
OF THE PROCEEDINGS AT THE
TENTH ANNUAL MEETING
BATTLE CREEK, MICHIGAN
DECEMBER 9 AND 10, 1919
CONTENTS
Page
Officers and Committees of the Association 4
Members of the Association 5
Constitution and By-Laws 9
Proceedings of the Tenth Annual Convention 11
President's Address, Mr W. C. Reed, Indiana 11
Report of the Secretary-Treasurer 14
Business Sessions 15, 133
The Farms by the Side of the Road,
Matthew Henry Hoover, New York 23
Native Nut Tree Plantations in Michigan,
Prof. A. K. Chittenden, Michigan 33
Pecans Other Than Those of the Well Known Sections,
J. F. Jones, Pennsylvania 44
Hazel Nuts and Filberts,
Conrad Vollertsen, New York 53
Disease Resistance in the American Chestnut,
Arthur H. Graves, Connecticut 60
Notes on the Hickories,
Dr. Robert T. Morris, New York 68
The Nutritive Value of Nuts,
F. A. Cajorie, Connecticut 80
Nut Trees and Bushes in Landscape Work,
O. C. Simonds, Illinois 88
Nut Culture in Michigan,
C. A. Reed, U. S. Department of Agriculture, 98
Nut Trees for Highways and Public Places,
Hon. William S. Linton, Michigan 108
Legislation Regarding the Planting of Nut and Other Food
Producing Trees, Senator Harvey A. Penney, Michigan 112
Michigan Law Regarding Roadside Planting of Nut Trees 116
The Soy Bean, Dr. J. H. Kellogg, Michigan 118
Judging Nuts, Willard G. Bixby, New York 122
The 1919 Nut Contest, Willard G. Bixby, New York 146
OFFICERS OF THE ASSOCIATION
_President_ W. S. LINTON Saginaw, Michigan
_Vice-President_ JAMES S. MCGLENNON Rochester, New York
_Secretary and Treasurer_ WILLARD G. BIXBY Baldwin, Nassau Co.,
New York
_Acting Secretary_ W. C. DEMING Wilton, Connecticut
COMMITTEES
_Auditing_--C. P. CLOSE, C. A. REED
_Executive_--J. RUSSELL SMITH, W. C. REED AND THE OFFICERS
_Federal Aid_--J. M. PATTERSON, R. T. MORRIS, J. H. KELLOGG, T. P.
LITTLEPAGE, WILLARD G. BIXBY, J. F. JONES, J. S. MCGLENNON
_Finance_--T. P. LITTLEPAGE, WILLARD G. BIXBY, W. C. DEMING
_Hybrids_--R. T. MORRIS, C. P. CLOSE, W. C. DEMING, J. G. RUSH
Membership--HARRY R. WEBER, R. T. OLCOTT, F. N. FAGAN. W. O.
POTTER, W. C. DEMING, J. RUSSELL SMITH
_Nomenclature_--C. A. REED, R. T. MORRIS, J. F. JONES
_Press and Publication_--RALPH T. OLCOTT, J. RUSSELL SMITH, W. C.
DEMING
_Programme_--W. C. DEMING, J. RUSSELL SMITH, C. A. REED, R. T.
MORRIS
_Promising Seedlings_--C. A. REED, J. F. JONES
STATE VICE-PRESIDENTS
California T. C. Tucker 311 California St., San Francisco
Canada G. H. Corsan 17 Rusholme Park Crescent, Toronto
Connecticut Henry Leroy Lewis Stratford
Georgia J. B. Wight Cairo
Illinois E. A. Riehl Godfrey
Indiana M. P. Reed Vincennes
Maryland C. P. Close College Park
Massachusetts James H. Bowditch 903 Tremont Building, Boston
Michigan Dr. J. H. Kellogg Battle Creek
Missouri P. C. Stark Louisiana
New Jersey C. S. Ridgway Lumberton
New York M. E. Wile 37 Calumet St., Rochester
Ohio Harry R. Weber 601 Gerke Building, Cincinnati
Pennsylvania J. G. Rush West Willow
Texas R. S. Trumbull M. S. R. R. Co., El Paso
West Virginia B. F. Hartzell Shepherdstown
MEMBERS OF THE NORTHERN NUT GROWERS ASSOCIATION
ARKANSAS
* Drake, Prof. N. F., University of Arkansas, Fayetteville
CALIFORNIA
Cress, B. E., Tehachapi
Tucker, T. C, Manager California Almond Growers Exchange, 311
California St., San Francisco
CANADA
Corsan, G. H., 17 Rusholme Park Crescent, Toronto
Sager, Dr. D. S., Brantford
CONNECTICUT
Barrows, Paul M., May Apple Farm, High Ridge, Stamford
Bartlett, Francis A., Stamford
Deming, Dr. W. C, Wilton
Filley, W. O., State Forester, Drawer 1, New Haven
Glover, James L., Shelton, R. F. D. 7
Hungerford, Newman, Torrington, R. F. D. 2, Box 76
Ives, Ernest M., Sterling Orchards, Meriden
Lewis, Henry Leroy, Stratford
McGlashan, Archibald, Kent
* Morris, Dr. Robert T., Cos Cob, Route 28, Box 95
Pomeroy, Eleazer, 120 Bloomfield Ave., Windsor
Sessions, Albert L., 25 Bellevue Ave., Bristol
Southworth, George E., Milford, Box 172
Staunton, Gray, 98 Park St., New Haven
White, Gerrard, North Granby
DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA
Close, Prof. C. P., Pomologist, Department of Agriculture, Washington
Foster, B. G., 902 G Street, N. W. Washington
* Littlepage, T. P., Union Trust Building, Washington
Reed, C. A., Nut Culturist, Department of Agriculture, Washington
Taylor, Dr. Lewis H., The Cecil, Washington
** Van Fleet, Walter, U. S. Department of Agriculture, Washington
ENGLAND
Spence, Howard, Eskdale, Knutsford, Cheshire
GEORGIA
Bullard, William P., Albany
Van Duzee, C. A., Judson Orchard Farm, Cairo
Wight, J. B., Cairo
ILLINOIS
Casper, O. H., Anna
Librarian, University of Illinois, Urbana
Poll, Carl J., 1009 Maple St., Danville
Potter, Hon. W. O., Marion
Riehl, E. A., Godfrey, Route 2
Uran, B. F., Mattoon
INDIANA
Crain, Donald J., 1313 North St., Logansport
Reed, M. P., Vincennes
Reed, W. C., Vincennes
Simpson, H. D., Vincennes
Staderman, A. L., 120 S. Seventh St., Terre Haute
Wilkinson, J. F., Rockport
IOWA
Snyder, D. C., Center Point (Linn Co. Nurseries)
KANSAS
Sharpe, James, Council Grove, (Morris Co. Nurseries)
KENTUCKY
Baker, Sam C., Beaver Dam, R. D. 2
Livengood, Frank M., Berea
MARYLAND
Hoopes, Wilmer P., Forest Hill
Keenan, Dr. John F., Brentwood
Littlepage, Miss Louise, Bowie
MASSACHUSETTS
* Bowditch, James H., 903 Tremont Building, Boston
Cleaver, C. Leroy, 496 Commonwealth Ave., Boston
MICHIGAN
House, George W., Ford Building, Detroit
Kellogg, Dr. J. H., 202 Manchester St., Battle Creek
Linton, W. S., President Board of Trade Saginaw
McKale, H. B., Lansing, Route 6
Schram, Mrs. O. E., Galesburg, Box 662
MISSOURI
Mosnat, H. R., 3883 East 62 St., Kansas City
Stark, P. C., Louisiana
Ward, Miss Daisy, 2019 Allen Ave., St. Louis
NEBRASKA
Caha, Wm., Wahoo
NEVADA
Swingle, C. G., Hazen
NEW JERSEY
* Jaques, Lee W., 74 Waverly St., Jersey City Heights
Landmann, Miss M. V., Cranbury, R. D. 2
Marston, Edwin S., Florham Park, Box 72
Price, John R., 36 Ridgedale Ave., Madison
Ridgeway, C. S., Floralia, Lumberton
NEW YORK
Abbott, Frederick B., 419 Ninth Street, Brooklyn
Ashworth, Fred L., Heuvelton
Atwater, C. G., The Barrett Co., 17 Battery Place, New York City
Bixby, Willard G., 32 Grand Ave., Baldwin, Nassau Co.
Brown, Ronald J., 320 Broadway, New York City
Buist, Dr. George J., 2 Hancock St., Brooklyn
Crane, Alfred J., Monroe, Box 342
Ellwanger, Mrs. W. D., 510 East Ave., Rochester
Goeltz, Mrs. M. H., 2524 Creston Ave., New York City
Harper, G. W., Jr., 115 Broadway, New York City
Hicks, Henry, Westbury, Long Island
Hodgson, Casper W., World Book Co., Yonkers
* Huntington, A. M., 15 West 81st St., New York City
McGlennon, James S., 528 Cutler Building, Rochester
Olcott, Ralph T., Editor American Nut Journal, Ellwanger and
Barry Building, Rochester
Pomeroy, A. C., Lockport
Stephen, John W., New York State College of Forestry, Syracuse
Tallinger, J. F., Barnard
Teele, A. W., 120 Broadway, New York City
Ulman, Dr. Ira, 213 W. 147th St., New York City
Vollertsen, Conrad, 375 Gregory St., Rochester
Wile, M. E., 955 Harvard St., Rochester
Williams, Dr. Charles Mallory, 48 E. 49th St., New York City
* Wissman, Mrs. F. deR., Westchester, New York City
NORTH CAROLINA
Barrett, Dr. Harvey P., 211 Vail Ave., Charlotte
Hutchings, Miss Lida G., Pine Bluff
North Carolina Dept. of Agriculture, Raleigh
Van Lindley, J., J. Van Lindley Nursery Co., Pomona
OHIO
Burton, J. Howard, Casstown
Dayton, J. H., Storrs & Harrison Co., Painesville
Ketchum, C. S., Middlefield
Truman, G. G., Perrysville, Box 167
Weber, Harry R., 123 East 6th St., Cincinnati
Yunck, E. G., 706 Central Ave., Sandusky
OREGON
Pearcy, Knight, Salem, R. F. D. 3, Box 187
PENNSYLVANIA
Druckemiller, W. H., Sunbury
Fagan, Prof. F. N., Department of Horticulture, State College
Heffner, H., Highland Chestnut Grove, Leeper
Hile, Anthony, Curwensville National Bank, Curwensville
Jenkins, Charles Francis, Farm Journal, Philadelphia
* Jones, J. F., Lancaster, Box 527
Kaufman, M. M., Clarion
Leas, F. C., Merion Station
Murphy, P. J., Vice President L. & W. R. R. Co., Scranton
O'Neill, William C., 328 Walnut St., Philadelphia
Patterson, J. E., 77 N. Franklin St., Wilkes-Barre
* Rick, John, 438 Pennsylvania Square, Reading
Rife, Jacob A., Camp Hill
Rush, J. G., West Willow
Smedley, Samuel L., Newtown Square, R. F. D. 1
* Sober, Col. C. K., Lewisburg
Weaver, William S., McCungie
Wilhelm, Dr. Edward A., Clarion
* Wister, John C., Wister St. & Clarkson Ave., Germantown
SOUTH CAROLINA
Shanklin, Prof. A. G., Clemson College
TEXAS
Burkett, J. H., Nut Specialist, State Department of Agriculture, Clyde.
Trumbull, R. S., Agricultural Agent, El Paso & S. W., System Morenci
Southern R. R. Co., El Paso
VIRGINIA
Parish, John S., University
Smith, Dr. J. Russell, Roundhill
WEST VIRGINIA
Brooks, Fred E., French Creek
Cannaday, Dr. John Egerton, Charleston, Box 693
Hartzell, B. F., Shepherdstown
Jenkins, Miss, The Green Bottom Homestead, Glenwood P. O.
* Life member.
** Honorary member.
CONSTITUTION
ARTICLE I
_Name._ This society shall be known as the NORTHERN NUT GROWERS'
ASSOCIATION.
ARTICLE II
_Object._ Its object shall be the promotion of interest in nut-bearing
plants, their products and their culture.
ARTICLE III
_Membership._ Membership in the society shall be open to all persons who
desire to further nut culture, without reference to place of residence
or nationality, subject to the rules and regulations of the committee on
membership.
ARTICLE IV
_Officers._ There shall be a president, a vice-president and a
secretary-treasurer, who shall be elected by ballot at the annual
meeting; and an executive committee of five persons, of which the
president, two last retiring presidents, vice-president and
secretary-treasurer shall be members. There shall be a state
vice-president from each state, dependency, or country represented in
the membership of the association, who shall be appointed by the
president.
ARTICLE V
_Election of Officers._ A committee of five members shall be elected at
the annual meeting for the purpose of nominating officers for the
following year.
ARTICLE VI
_Meetings._--The place and time of the annual meeting shall be selected
by the membership in session or, in the event of no selection being made
at this time, the executive committee shall choose the place and time
for the holding of the annual convention. Such other meetings as may
seem desirable may be called by the president and executive committee.
ARTICLE VII
_Quorum._ Ten members of the association shall constitute a quorum, but
must include a majority of the executive committee or two of the three
elected officers.
ARTICLE VIII
_Amendments._ This constitution may be amended by a two-thirds vote of
the members present at any annual meeting, notice of such amendment
having been read at the previous annual meeting, or a copy of the
proposed amendment having been mailed by any member to each member
thirty days before the date of the annual meeting.
BY-LAWS
ARTICLE I
_Committees._ The association shall appoint standing committees as
follows: On membership, on finance, on programme, on press and
publication, on nomenclature, on promising seedlings, on hybrids, and an
auditing committee. The committee on membership may make recommendations
to the association as to the discipline or expulsion of any member.
ARTICLE II
_Fees._ The fees shall be of two kinds, annual and life. The former
shall be two dollars, the latter twenty dollars.
ARTICLE III
_Membership._ All annual memberships shall begin with the first day of
the calendar quarter following the date of joining the association.
ARTICLE IV
_Amendments._ By-laws may be amended by a two-thirds vote of members
present at any annual meeting.
Northern Nut Growers Association
TENTH ANNUAL MEETING
DECEMBER 9 AND 10, 1919
BATTLE CREEK, MICHIGAN
The tenth annual meeting of the Northern Nut Growers' Association was
called to order at 11:00 A. M., Tuesday, December 9, 1919, in the Annex
Parlor of the Battle Creek Sanitarium, Battle Creek, Michigan, with the
President, W. C. Reed, presiding.
The meeting was opened with a short business session beginning with the
President's report as follows:
PRESIDENT'S ADDRESS
W. C. REED, VINCENNES, IND.
FELLOW MEMBERS, NORTHERN NUT GROWERS ASSOCIATION, LADIES AND
GENTLEMEN:
Our Association meets today under the most favorable surroundings. We
have this splendid building in which to hold our meetings, furnished
gratuitously also have with us in this wonderful Institution several
thousand guests, men and women of ability and prominence in their
respective communities, from all parts of the United States.
Dr. Kellogg has been very kind and generous in extending an invitation
several times to this association, and your speaker has thought there
was no place quite so well suited for a winter meeting. It gives me
great pleasure to be able to be with you and preside over a meeting as
the guests of Dr. Kellogg. There is probably no man in America who has
done so much to further the use of nuts, to show their benefits, and to
explain their uses, as a food for mankind.
Conditions have changed greatly since our last meeting, September 1917,
at Stamford, Connecticut. At that time the greater part of the world was
at war, and owing to conditions prevailing during 1918, it was
impossible for this association to hold its annual meeting. Your speaker
is still holding the office of President because you have had no meeting
at which new officers could be elected. It is to be regretted that the
past three years have been crowded so full of events, that it was
impossible to give the association matters the attention they deserved,
and devote the time to them I would have liked to have done.
With the armistice came a cessation of war, and we are all happy that
the terrible struggle is over, but with it have come conditions that
are almost as terrible as war. Famine and want stare millions of people
in the face on the continent of Europe. Our own country is at present in
the grip of strikes for higher wages, the like of which has never been
known. Yet we are prosperous beyond the greatest dreams of any nation on
earth, but with this prosperity comes many duties. Our yields of food
crops have been great, but to us has fallen the lot of feeding the
world, and this will continue until industrial and agricultural
conditions of Europe, have been reestablished on a pre-war condition.
There never was a time when meats of all kinds were so expensive, and to
many almost prohibitive. Many have learned the use of nut meats in
varied ways until all kinds of edible nuts are quoted on the markets
today at prices undreamed of in former years. These conditions will not
always last; crop failures will come; and production will be curtailed.
Land values are advancing so rapidly that the production of cheap meats
will be impossible. To help supply this deficiency, there will be an
increased demand for nuts of all kinds.
To help meet this demand, much can be done by road side planting. On our
main market highways, such trees as the grafted black walnuts could be
planted profitably, in many sections of the country; the English walnut
in some parts where they succeed the best; and the pecan and chestnut in
other parts of the country where they are specially adapted.
While commercial planting of nut trees may not be attractive to the
average man, home planting of a few nut trees can be recommended for
every where space is available. They will make beautiful shade trees,
and produce crops that will eventually be of great value. To land owners
who are planting private parks, avenues and pastures, we would recommend
nut trees.
The production of nut trees is very difficult, and the development and
testing of new varieties, a slow and expensive process. We need the
Government's helping hand, and are very glad that there has been set
aside by Congress an appropriation to help develop this industry. We
have with us, the Nut Culturist from the Department of Agriculture, who
is devoting his entire time along these lines.
On the programme that is to be presented here, today and tomorrow, are
men of national reputation in their respective lines, who stand at the
head of their profession. To our friends and visitors here, we extend an
urgent invitation, that you attend all the meetings possible, and we
trust that you may learn much that will be of interest, and that this
information may be taken home to your different communities.
Our sincere thanks should be extended to the Programme Committee and our
very efficient Secretary who have given so much time to this work.
For an association to stand still, is usually to go backward. Owing to
war conditions, and missing one meeting, we have had little chance to
increase our membership. I sincerely trust that the Membership Committee
will be active while here, and extend an invitation to all to become
members, and to help advance an industry that will be for the good of
posterity, and should give us much pleasure during our own lifetime.
We are told, the good we do unto others lives after us. May the Nut
Trees planted and fostered by the members of this association, live long
to wave their leafy branches under Heaven's purple dome, and may weary
pilgrims of future generations rest beneath their shade, and enjoy their
fruits, thanking us with a silent prayer that these trees were planted
for their benefit.
PRESIDENT REED: I believe the next thing in order will be the
reading of the secretary's and treasurer's reports. Does any one have
anything to present while we are waiting for the secretary, who is busy?
DR. MORRIS: How many members have we, Mr. President?
PRESIDENT REED: I don't know. Several have written me asking
about members, and Mr. Olcott probably knows something about it.
MR. OLCOTT: I don't know how many there are now; but I think
there were 150 or 200 at the time of the Stamford meeting. I think there
were that many enrolled. I presume that two-thirds of those
renewed--probably something over 100 members.
PRESIDENT REED: There were 138 paid members.
DR. MORRIS: Dr. Kellogg says there may be a thousand men in the
audience this evening, and if there are we ought to do some propaganda
work.
PRESIDENT REED: I don't remember who the membership committee
was. Mr. Weber was chairman, I believe, and he is not here. Olcott is
next on the committee.
MR. OLCOTT: I didn't know I was on that committee.
PRESIDENT REED: Fagan was on that committee, Potter, Deming,
Williams, J. Russell Smith. I guess you are the only member of the
committee who is here. We are ready for the report of the secretary and
treasurer, Mr. Bixby.
* * * * *
REPORT OF THE SECRETARY-TREASURER
SEPT. 1, 1917-NOV. 30, 1919
Key:
A: Sep. 1. '17 to Dec. 31, '17
B: Jan. 1, '18 to May 20, '18
C: May 21, '18 to Dec. 31, '18
D: Jan. 1, '19 to Nov. 30, '19
RECEIPTS
A B C D Total Balance
Balance on hand date of
last report, August 31,
1917. $ 15.93
Received from annual
members including joint
subscriptions to
American Nut Journal $69.50 $123.54 $ 73.75 $247.35 $514.14
Received in payment of
life membership 20.00 25.00 45.00
Sale of reports, brochures
and leaflets 2.25 4.00 9.95 4.85 21.05
Advertising in report of
Stamford meetings 8th,
1917 21.00 21.00
Sales of sundry material. 1.58 1.58
Contributions for 1917
Contest 25.00 125.00 150.00
Contribution for special
hickory prizes 25.00 25.00
------- ------- ------- ------- ------- -------
$112.75 $145.12 $108.70 $427.20 $793.77 $793.77
-------
$809.70
EXPENDITURES
American Nut Journal,
their portion of joint
subscriptions $ 6.75 $ 14.00 $ 59.00 $ 79.75
Stationary, printing and
Supplies .69 44.05 49.50 94.24
Postage, Express, etc. 4.82 13.95 9.66 9.24 37.67
Prizes 1917 Nut Contest 15.00 15.00
Prize 1918 Nut Contest 107.00 107.00
Advertising 1917 Nut
Contest $10.21; expenses
1917 contest $2.90 13.11 13.11
Advertising 1918 Nut
Contest 51.50 51.50
Stamford Meeting 1917
expenses 65.55 65.55
Printing Report of
Stamford Meeting 162.00 162.00
Errors in remittance
corrected 3.85 3.50 7.35
Litchfield Savings Bank.
Life membership of John
Rick Balance on hand
Dec. 1, 1919. 20.00 20.00
------ ------ ------- ------- ------- -------
$97.81 $30.91 $244.71 $279.74 $653.17
$653.17
Balance on hand Dec. 1, 1919.
Special hickory prize 25.00
Life membership Lee W.
Jaques 25.00
For regular expenses. 106.53
-------
$809.70
I have carefully been over the above statement and found it to be correct.
C. A. REED, for Auditing Committee.
The above are records of receipts and expenditures for two years
and three months and are approximately double those noted in the
report of of the Stamford meeting. The activities of the
Association were necessarily at a low ebb in war time, and,
although a joint meeting with the National Association was planned
for the fall of 1918, it was never held.
The list of members printed in this report numbers 128 while that
in the last one shows 166, apparently a very large decrease. The
last report showed 138 paid up members. Following the methods of
Secretary Deming, members who have not responded to notices and
letters have been dropped. In no case has a member been dropped
until a letter with return postage has been sent. In a number of
instances members thus written to have resigned giving various
reasons, the most common of which are change of occupation or
residence, which prevented their doing anything in the line of nut
growing or lack of success in their attempts to grow nuts. Two
members have died since the last meeting, Mr. Wendell P. Williams
and Mr. Mahlon Hutchinson; the former was in the U. S. Service at
the time of his death. 57 new members have been added to our rolls
since 1917 making a total of 410 joining since organization of whom
we now have 128, 282 having dropped out. Of the 52 who have joined
since last meeting, 21 joined before Oct. 1, 1919 the date of the
proposed meeting in Albany, Ga., which was never held, and 31 since
that date.
The holding of members is a difficult problem and one that has not
been worked out at all satisfactorily. Most members join in the
hope of thereby learning how to successfully grow nut trees. They
find out that so much is still experimental that most do not
remain. This is bound to continue till we can show grafted or
budded nut trees bearing satisfactory crops, and, until that time,
there seems nothing to do but to keep on going after new members
and by means of bulletins, reports, letters and otherwise making
the membership more valuable than ever. There has been a greater
interest in nut growing during the past fall than at any time since
your Secretary-Treasurer has held office.
Respectfully submitted,
WILLARD G. BIXBY,
Secretary-Treasurer.
* * * * *
PRESIDENT REED: You have heard the report. What is your
pleasure? I believe that is usually referred to an auditing committee.
C. A. Reed was chairman of that committee.
MR. BIXBY: Mr. Reed spoke to me about this yesterday. He said
he would be glad to audit it, but there has not been time to give it to
him. It was ready for him this morning, but he was busy on other things.
PRESIDENT REED: What is the next thing on the program, Mr.
Secretary?
MR. BIXBY: The reports of committees. I do not know how much
report the standing committees have.
PRESIDENT REED: There is the executive committee, the finance
committee, the hybrids committee--maybe Dr. Morris has something on
that.
DR. MORRIS: No, I have no report to make on that. I shall talk
on the subject this afternoon or in the course of my paper incidentally.
I didn't see any occasion for action in that direction since the last
meeting, so I have not acted except incidentally in the course of my
work.
PRESIDENT REED: The committee on nomenclature--of course they
wouldn't have any report until after this meeting.
MR. BIXBY: Who is on that committee?--C. A. Reed, Dr. Morris,
and J. F. Jones. Two members of the committee are here. There is one
matter which perhaps I better bring up to the committee first,--one
matter I think they should take some action on.
PRESIDENT REED: I think it would be best to have that come up
at a later time.
DR. MORRIS: I would like to bring in something incidentally in
relation to nomenclature in my paper. Perhaps we could have the question
discussed after I have brought up that point.
PRESIDENT REED: There is a committee on promising seedlings C.
A. Reed, and J. F. Jones. I think that covers all the standing
committees. Wasn't there a committee on nominations for officers to be
elected, this morning?
MR. BIXBY: That nominating committee has to be elected.
PRESIDENT REED: How many members?
MR. BIXBY: There were four or five last time, I think.
PRESIDENT REED: (Reading by-laws calling for five members).
MR. BIXBY: I move Mr. Olcott be on the committee.
VOICE: I second the motion.
PRESIDENT REED: It has been moved and seconded that Mr. Olcott
be elected as a member of the nominating committee. All in favor say,
Aye. It is so ordered. Who else shall we have, for a second member?
MR. LINTON: I move Mr. Bixby be a member of the committee.
MR. BIXBY: There is a precedent that the secretary has never
been a member of the nominating committee. He has sometimes given them
information. I move Dr. Morris, Mr. Jones, and Mr. Linton be members of
the nominating committee, and Mr. McGlennon.
MR. MCGLENNON: I second the motion.
MR. OLCOTT: The committee as you suggested it is Dr. Morris,
Mr. J. F. Jones, Mr. Linton, Mr. McGlennon and myself?
PRESIDENT REED: You have heard the motion. All in favor say
Aye. The committee stands elected as named. They report at tomorrow
morning's meeting. I think there is one matter it would be well to bring
up, and that is the membership committee.
MR. OLCOTT: I was going to suggest that is an important matter,
and I think that committee should be filled out with those who are
present, inasmuch as the regular members are not here. It looks as
though a comparatively small membership would have to double up on
membership committee.
PRESIDENT REED: Have you any suggestions as to whom you want on
that committee?
MR. BIXBY: Those committees, with the exception of the
nominating committee, are appointed by the president. I think myself
that the new president appoints them.
PRESIDENT REED: My idea was to appoint for this meeting and
help Mr. Olcott out.
MR. OLCOTT: I suggest Mr. McGlennon and Mr. Jones as two of the
members.
PRESIDENT REED: Let it stand as it is with the three and give
the chairman power to appoint two more later.
MR. MCGLENNON: Can the secretary tell us how many members there
are?
MR. BIXBY: One hundred sixty-four notices of this meeting were
sent out. There are 128 paid up members.
MR. OLCOTT: On the matter of membership, I wonder if the
association could suggest some inducement for membership, or summarize
the inducements. As you know, the American Association of Nurserymen has
been desirous of more members, and they found it very advisable to
outline definitely the benefits of membership in that association. I am
wondering if that has been done recently and could not be emphasized in
some way to the advantage of larger membership. You have got to do
something more than say that there is in existence an association
devoted to these purposes and everybody is invited to come in. Maybe the
secretary has something on that line.
MR. BIXBY: I have no suggestion. It is very evident that there
is a greatly increased interest in nut growing over what there was when
I first took up the office. That is very clearly brought out by the
amount of mail received. You may know that Capt. Deming, when in the
service, took the position of editing the nut department of the American
Fruit Grower. I saw him recently and it looks to me as if, as editor of
that department, he is answering about as many correspondents on nuts
and trying to boost the association in that way as he did when he was
secretary before. And that would appear to be in addition to the
communications that are coming to me now.
MR. OLCOTT: There is interest. We get at the Journal office a
great quantity of inquiries but only a small per cent of them result in
memberships and subscriptions, and while this interest is so strong,
ought not this association to study that which is something of a
problem--perhaps something that ought to be taken up in view of the
interests and the benefits of the association shown.
PRESIDENT REED: I think that is a good suggestion. I think they
need something along that line. Is there anything else we want to bring
up at this morning session?
MR. MCGLENNON: Is this not a very good field to open up
operations along that line, right here at Battle Creek? A large number
of people who come here are people who eat nuts, and I believe that
condition would resolve itself into a material advance of membership. I
think we ought to get busy right here and see if we can not enlist the
membership of a great number of the patrons of this institution.
MR. OLCOTT: That was the principal object of the membership
committee I suppose. My idea was to get the ideas of the individual
members, put them together and present a broadside of benefits in this
organization rather than have one man attempt to outline them.
DR. MORRIS: There is an immense amount of interest. The
question is how to get it together and formulate it in such a way that
men will join. There is an enormous, large loose majority, and we must
have a small compact minority to swing it as the Senators do down at
Washington, you know. Prof. Murrill of the New York Botanical Garden
told me that wherever he went (he is interested in mushrooms, that is
his special subject) he had had no idea in the world there was so much
interest of the public in mushrooms; yet when it comes to getting
together members to form the base of an association to study the
subject, he finds very few members. It is simply because men haven't got
the habit, and we have got in some way to give direction to that in such
a way that it will be focused and concentrated on some one objective
point. How to do it, I don't know.
MR. BIXBY: Dr. Kellogg suggested that at the meeting this
evening there will be the largest number of people, not members, that
there has been at any meeting; and he said he had had requests from
people that they wanted to hear Dr. Morris, and they wanted to hear
Prof. Cajori who used to be here, and he asked me to change those from
this afternoon to this evening in order to accomplish that, and I said
we would switch the program. That was for that very purpose.
MR. OLCOTT: Mr. President, it just occurred to me that in view
of the number of inquiries we get, and I am sure the secretary gets, and
I am also sure Dr. Deming gets from his articles, there is no doubt of
the interest, yet the joining of this Northern Association, and the
attendance of its single annual meeting, does not appeal to many. They
do not find it convenient to attend the convention; they do not see any
great amount of benefit in the membership. It occurs to me that if we
had a list of state vice-presidents and each of those could provide for
some local gathering of people interested in nut culture in the various
communities; rather, I would say that if our members, as fast as we can
increase our membership, wherever they are located, would form a nucleus
of a little circle in their neighborhood, and have them affiliated with
the Northern Association; it would accomplish this result. And afterward
it occurred to me that perhaps that could be done through state
vice-presidents. But what is really needed is to get them together in
meetings. They won't come yet. They will when you get a larger
membership, but they won't come to the annual meeting of this
association where I think they would go to a community affair and talk
over matters and refer difficult problems to the Northern Association of
which they were affiliated members. In some way, a wheel within a wheel
could work at it that way, and we could increase membership in that way.
DR. MORRIS: It is a rule in psychology that you have got to
have personal interest first. If Mr. Olcott's idea of having a local
vice-president offer prizes, no matter how small, for nuts in the
vicinity, and would also state that any one finding some remarkable nut
would have that nut named after him to go down to all time, you would
have two points there in self-interest. First, a five dollar prize to
the best nut; next the name going rattling down through time in
association with it. There are two points of personal interest. We may
as well take it back to the basic principles and begin with the
psychology of the situation.
MR. KETCHUM: Mr. President, in regard to these vice-presidents,
that point looks to me very good for this reason. I saw it work out in
the Minnesota State Horticultural Society. They had a vice-president in
each congressional district. I was vice-president in the third district
one year myself From them reports were sent from their district by
people who were interested. They were asked to fill out blanks about
conditions as they found them in their neighborhood and we got great
good from it. Then this vice-president was to make a general district
report from the reports sent him, and hand it in at the annual meeting.
It was quite a success.
DR. MORRIS: There you have civic pride brought into your psychology.
MR. KETCHUM: That was in the third district which included the
northeast part of the state. It was quite a large district
geographically, and I sent out something like seventy of these blank
reports, and while the interest was very slight, I think I got 23 field
reports in return, and out of those 23 were some nine or ten that were
of some considerable importance; but it was a great big help to me in
making out my report together with what I knew in my own location. The
percentage of reports that came back showed that there was great
interest taken by those persons.
DR. MORRIS: You can arouse local pride in any locality.
PRESIDENT REED: I have tried that in our own state in the last
two or three years, at county fairs and local district horticultural
meetings. Several times I have offered prizes out of my own pocket
individually; then I have gotten other parties to help in some cases,
and some exhibits even at county farmers' institutes, even very
creditable exhibits and they seemed to attract as much interest even as
the school exhibits. I know of one case at Martinsville two years ago
this winter where the nut exhibit was almost as large as the fruit
exhibit, and I think it attracted more attention; and I think there was
only something like ten dollars spent in order to get it out. I think
that work along that line, missionary work of that kind, is going to do
us more good than almost any other endeavor.
MR. OLCOTT: I do not think that the industry is old enough or
strong enough yet, perhaps, to operate that state vice-president plan as
it would be perhaps later on, for this reason, that if you have a state
vice-president, you narrow the activity in that state to that immediate
locality. But it would probably be much better, instead of that, to
endeavor to get each member to form the nucleus of a local circle, and
so have ten or a dozen in a state, instead of one.
PRESIDENT REED: I think that suggestion is better.
MR. OLCOTT: That was my original idea, and the state
vice-president idea came in afterwards.
MR. MCGLENNON: How many states are included in the northern association
territory?
MR. BIXBY: There is no limit.
DR. MORRIS: Northern is a relative term.
PRESIDENT REED: I don't think there is any clearly defined line
where the Northern Association is.
MR. OLCOTT: For the reason that men live in the North are
interested in lands in the South, and _vice versa_.
PRESIDENT REED: There are twenty-three vice-presidents on the
list here, in the last published report. Is there anything else that
should come up at the morning session? Mr. Secretary, do you know of
anything else?
MR. BIXBY: I would really like to see something definite on
this line of increasing the membership. I can think of several things
that will help; but to get something that is going to have action right
away is not so clear. Recently I have had a good many people come down
to my place to look at the small orchard I have there. I aim to have
varieties of every nut tree that is being propagated, and I think if I
keep at it a few years longer I will pretty nearly have them; and in
most cases, when people have come down that way, they have become
members afterwards. Two or three of them have. I am only twenty miles
from New York City, and it is not difficult, if I find someone
interested, to invite them down to look over the trees growing there,
and usually when they come they join afterwards.
MR. OLCOTT: Pardon me for speaking again, but I am on the
membership committee and I am anxious to draw out anything that may be
of use. Why could not some plan be devised by the secretary or by this
committee and sent out tentatively in the way of suggestion and perhaps
some other suggestions will be made to add to it. Perhaps also in
addition to this local community plan that I suggested, there might be
formed, all of it within the Northern Association, a subsidiary
thereto--the walnut society--people particularly interested in the
walnut, but do not care for the hickory, pecan or any other nut. You
will find people particularly interested in the black walnut, some in
the Persian walnut, some in the filbert--form a filbert society as the
American Nut Journal has suggested, and let all the enthusiasts of the
filbert get together, and if they are scattered, let them keep together
by correspondence and increased activity in that way. The same for the
butternut. Get at it from that way.
MR. KETCHUM: Another thing to further our society here today,
we can make those small organizations auxiliary thereto.
DR. MORRIS: Any one who is interested in one nut becomes
interested in all eventually.
MR. BIXBY: I received more inquiries regarding the Persian
walnut and the pecan than any other nuts--probably more regarding the
Persian walnut. Nearly everybody who writes wants to grow Persian
walnuts; and in the great majority of instances, I have to try to switch
them onto black walnuts with the suggestion that they plant a few
Persian walnuts because we have no experimental data of the Persian
walnut succeeding in their section. In some instances they will turn to
the black walnuts; in other instances I hear nothing further from them.
The Persian walnut is the most popular with people who have not tried to
grow any nuts. Mr. Jones perhaps can tell us how his inquiries run.
Don't they run very largely for Persian walnuts?
MR. JONES: Yes, they do. I was thinking possibly you could make
a combination--take, for instance, the membership, the nut journal, and
some nut trees. The nurserymen could make considerable concession.
DR. MORRIS: That combination is right well.
MR. JONES: You could give a coupon good for so much on an order
for trees or something of that sort.
MR. BIXBY: That suggestion was made and I referred it to the
executive committee. I have not had any reply.
PRESIDENT REED: I didn't have time to answer the communication
and get it back to you before I came here; so I thought we would decide
on that here. If there is nothing further to come up this morning, a
motion to adjourn will be in order until the afternoon session.
MR. BIXBY: I might repeat that at the request of Dr. Kellogg,
in order to get the papers which he had been particularly requested to
have given so that people could hear them, Dr. Morris and Prof. Cajori
who were scheduled this afternoon, will come this evening, and Mr.
Hoover's and Mr. Graves' papers, which were scheduled for this evening,
will have to come this afternoon. Neither of the writers are present,
but the papers are here. Mr. Graves expected to be here but I had a
telegram yesterday that he could not get away. I have the paper, though
and the photographs.
MR. MCGLENNON: Has there been provision made for a paper on
filberts by Mr. Vollertsen? If not, I should like to have it.
MR. BIXBY: Certainly, there can be. It ought to come in this
afternoon. I wrote Mr. Vollertsen asking if he could deliver it.
MR. MCGLENNON: He has the paper prepared, and I want to hear
it. I have been closely associated with Mr. Vollertsen for some ten
years, and I know that his whole heart and soul are in the development
of the filbert; and I know what he has done and that he is a rare
character in the nut world today, that he possesses a fund of
information. I am sure you will find intensely interesting; and
furthermore I would suggest, and I believe I speak for him when I say I
hope you will feel free to ask him questions. As I said before, he has a
fund of information that I think we nut people ought to have, and the
general public as well. We have a very good exhibit of the nuts. Mr.
Vollertsen is the practical man in the enterprise we are interested in.
I look after the business end of it. We are equally interested in it and
feel that we have made some progress.
DR. MORRIS: Put Mr. McGlennon on too.
MR. MCGLENNON: I have said all I can say.
MR. VOLLERTSEN: You have said too much.
PRESIDENT REED: If there is nothing else, we will stand
adjourned until 2:30 p. m.
* * * * *
TUESDAY AFTERNOON, DECEMBER 9, 1919, 2:30 P. M.
PRESIDENT W. C. REED, IN THE CHAIR
PRESIDENT REED: The first paper is by Mr. Hoover, Matthew Henry
Hoover, of Lockport, N. Y., president of the New York State Conservation
Association. Mr. Hoover is not here, and the Secretary will read his
paper.
THE FARMS BY THE SIDE OF THE ROAD
BY MATTHEW HENRY HOOVER, LOCKPORT, N. Y.
FORMERLY NEW YORK CONSERVATION COMMISSIONER
PRESIDENT NEW YORK STATE CONSERVATION ASSOCIATION
Horace Greeley is best known for his contribution to the abolition of
human slavery in the United States. Yet his service to mankind is not
fully appraised by the average American, because many of the younger
generation are unaware of his aid to agriculture. His maxim about
farmers' failing to till the most valuable part of their farms
underneath, opening the eyes of agriculturists to the efficacy of
sub-soil plowing, was the preamble to freeing American husbandry from
the slavery of antiquated and unscientific methods.
Following the application of science to the cultivation of the soil,
came the students of Conservation. They were teaching the farmer the
relation of conservation of natural resources to agriculture, the
effects of forests on rainfall, moisture, erosion of soil, minimization
of floods that annually bury thousands of acres of arable lands in the
valleys, under rocky debris and so on.
Greeley discovered the Farm Below. The Conservationists are saving the
Farm Above.
Now, in these days of reclamation and reconstruction, it is high time to
pay more attention to the Farm by the Side of the Road.
The Northern Nut Growers' Association is to be congratulated upon the
fact that it is blazing the trail through the forest of popular
ignorance on this vitally important conservation question; leading
public thought in the right direction; and providing both the seed and
the stock for practical efforts in behalf of the Farm by the Side of the
Road. I am going to claim a bond of brotherhood with you in this great
work, basing my claim not upon my small activities in nut cultivation,
but rather upon the fact that I was one of the conservation pioneers in
New York State in the advocacy of planting profitable trees--nut trees
and fruit trees--along the public highways.
That eminent conservationist, Gifford Pinchot, addressing the National
Council of Farmers' Co-operative Associations in 1915, defined
"Conservation" as "the wise use of the earth for the benefit of the
people who live on it." That would be a perfect definition, if it did
not invite the query: Should it not be enjoined upon the people who live
upon the earth today, while enjoying its benefits, to keep faithful
stewardship of the interests of the inhabitants of tomorrow?
About the time Mr. Pinchot enunciated this famous definition, the New
York State Conservation Department summed up the purposes of practical
Conservation as: "The correction of past indiscretion, the perfection of
present utilization, and the formation of future accumulation with
respect to natural resources."
Conservation activities must repair errors of the past which have left
denuded forest lands and empty game covers and waters; they must afford
and direct the present use of the forests and the streams; they must
safeguard the future supply, if they would meet the requirements of a
conservation which shall raise the standards of life and lower the cost
of living. That is a conservation embracing both the aesthetic and the
economic, the only kind worth while. It is a conservation wherein the
arable areas and the so-called waste lands and waters have a very
intimate interrelation of interests. And, I submit, Gentlemen, that the
American people too long have failed to recognize and to account as in
the class of waste lands, "The Farms by the Side of the Road."
The reclamation of waste lands is a compromise between the activities of
the Conservationists, who claim that in the more thickly inhabited
portions of the United States the cultivated or semi-cultivated areas
are out of sane and safe proportion to the wild forest sections, and the
advocates of intensive and extensive agriculture. It is not the purpose
of this article to take sides in that controversy, but rather to invite
attention of both sides to a safe and practical field for their
endeavors, namely, the reclamation of the "wasted lands" along the
roadsides, the farms along the highways.
During the War Garden campaigns of the past two years, these heretofore
largely unused strips of tillable land, forming in the aggregate
thousands of along-the-road acres in every state, received considerable
attention from the thrifty plow and hoe. But in the main, the results
were not encouraging. The public will trespass, unintentionally or
otherwise, upon the land cropped along the highway. Then, if the farms
by the side of the road are to be conserved--used by present as well as
future generations--there remains but one practical recourse: productive
trees.
The American people love beautiful trees, possibly the expression of a
reaction from the sentiment of the pioneers who regarded trees as their
enemies, handicaps to agriculture to be removed as thoroughly and
expeditiously as possible. But with virgin soil producing enormous
crops, they naturally centered their interest on ornamental trees
without reference to their fruits. Hence the horse-chestnut, buck-eye,
maple, locust, oak, poplar, along the highways and byways of America,
instead of the native nut trees and the Persian or English walnut.
And, speaking of highways, this is the age of concrete. Taking the hint,
I am selecting one concrete example of which I have intimate and
personal knowledge, well aware that there are numerous others that I
might cite were my acquaintance with practical nut culture more
extensive than it is. The one that I know about of my own personal
knowledge is, a very good example of the plain common sense of
productive trees which combine the useful with the ornamental.
IT READS LIKE A FAIRY TALE
In 1876 two Niagara County farmers, Norman Pomeroy and Matthew O'Connor,
neighbors, decided to go to the Centennial. They packed one carpet-bag
in common for their baggage and boarded the train for Philadelphia.
Although well to do farmers, their economic instincts warned them to
beware the profiteering hotel keepers. So they sought a humble boarding
house in the suburbs of the city. Returning one evening from
sight-seeing at the exposition, the travelers were so weary that they
retired immediately after supper. During the night Pomeroy was awakened
by a tapping on the window. Assuring himself that the wallet under his
pillow was still there, he investigated the cause of the disturbance of
his slumbers. The noise had ceased and he decided that the overstrain of
the day had worked an hallucination. Pomeroy dropped off to sleep, but
presently was aroused by sounds which were unmistakably caused by a
gentle tapping on the window pane. Exasperated, the man arose, picked up
a boot, slipped to the window and raised it gently ready to give the
joker or would-be burglar a rousing whack on the head if within reach.
He stuck his head out of the window for a better view of the exterior
world, and his curiosity was rewarded with a stinging blow on the cheek.
The pain aroused all the Pomeroy French Huguenot fighting blood in his
veins. Viciously he swung the boot at the unseen foe, only to hear it
crash through tree branches. Laughing softly, in his enlightenment, he
reached out into the night, grasped a branch, broke it off and turned on
the gas and lit it. On the twig were two curious nuts.
Pomeroy was a lover of nature, as I learned by many an interesting talk
with him. He found time in his regular farming pursuits to study native
trees and shrubs, and had forbidden his hired men to cut down any of the
native nut trees on his 500 acre farm. But the nuts on the branch
retrieved from darkness were specimens new to him and he could hardly
wait for daylight to come to enable him to get acquainted with the tree
which had invited his attention so rudely. Next morning Pomeroy learned
that his new found arboreal friend was a Persian walnut. It was loaded
and the wind storm of the night had covered the ground with shucked and
unshucked nuts. By permission of the landlord, he gathered a peck of the
Persian walnuts, wrapped O'Connor's and his own belongings in a
newspaper and filled the carpet-bag with the nut treasures. Arriving
home, the tourists stopped first at O'Connor's house. There they had to
relate the experience of their great trip to an assemblage of the two
families. The recounting of the Centennial wonders took until midnight.
When Pomeroy picked up his carpet-bag to go home, it was empty! The
children had made a discrete retirement after having consumed the entire
peck of English walnuts, as the shells in the kitchen disclosed.
Luckily for the youngsters, they were safe in bed and asleep.
The next day, according to the elder Pomeroy, little Albert who had not
been at the O'Connor home the night before, heard the dolorous tale of
the wonderful tree in Philadelphia, the gift of nuts and their weird
disappearance. To confirm the sad story he picked up the carpet-bag,
turned it inside out. Within a torn lining, he triumphantly extracted
ten nuts. Child-like, he proceeded to sample them and had eaten three
when his father rescued the remainder. Seven Philadelphia walnuts were
planted in the yard, and, in due time there were seven slender,
silver-grayish seedling trees. These were carefully staked, guarded and
cultivated by Norman Pomeroy. Despite the caviling of the neighbors, who
declared that a Persian walnut tree would not thrive and bear so far
north, twelve years after planting the "lucky seven" reproduced their
kind--from a dozen to two dozen large, handsome Persian or English
walnuts. Today the seven Centennial trees are about two feet in diameter
and about 60 feet high. And as to the value of the crop, one tree alone
produced nuts which sold four years ago for $142.50.
Now as to the application of this romance in real life. I must return to
the more prosaic generalizations of conservation and its relation to the
products of cultivation with which this article began.
In 1913 Governor Martin H. Glynn invited me to outline for him a program
of "Practical and Progressive Conservation", applicable to the needs of
New York State. In the effort to meet the request, I drew a little from
my personal experience and observations as a sportsman, a farmer and a
newspaper man, and a great deal from what I had learned from others
among the organized sportsmen, agricultural societies, hydro-electric
engineers, forest products men, foresters, and nature lovers in general.
We then set forth the following as necessary to the realization of the
purposes of a Conservation which should meet all conditions imposed by
the past, the present and the future, as hereinbefore stated:
"PRACTICAL AND PROGRESSIVE CONSERVATION"
1. Protect the birds and save the crops.
2. Develop the unutilized water powers, now going to waste with
destructive effects in freshet periods to arable lands and thickly
populated communities, through public ownership and distribution;
thereby use "The People's White Coal," save coal and cussin' the
ash-sifter, giving the public cheaper light and power for the homes, the
farms, the factories, and public highways.
3. Amend the constitution to permit the use of dead and down timber in
the state forest preserves, worth at least $10,000,000 annually.
4. Provide free forest trees furnished by the state for all who will
plant them. (Note--The present N. Y. Conservation Commission in a
special report to be made to the Legislature of 1920 has at last adopted
that progressive policy).
5. Plant productive trees along the highways--nut and fruit trees.
6. Restock waters and covers more extensively and intelligently.
7. Stop pollution of private and public waters.
8. Harmonize the interrelated interests of farmers and sportsmen.
9. Establish game and bird refuges in every county in the state.
10. Sane and practical game laws, eliminating prosecutions on petty
technicalities, educate the public to co-operate in fish and game
protection, enact legislation to encourage rather than handicap the
propagation of fish and game by private enterprise.
It will be noted that plank 5 in our progressive conservation platform
is urging the planting of producing trees along the highways. By that we
meant not only the native nut trees, all of which are beautiful and
ornamental, but also fruit trees, according to the wishes of the
abutting owners.
In the State of New York, taking into account only improved roads coming
under the head of State or County Improved Highways, disregarding the
mileage of the rural roads several times as large, there are about 8,000
miles of "Good Roads". There are many stretches of the highways which
nature has generously adorned with trees. Some portions of the roads
have witnessed the spoliation of the contractor's indiscriminating ax,
but in the main the workmen were as careful as possible to retain
natural shade trees along the routes. A few miles comparatively, were
planted by state agencies. Farmers, especially in the Lake Ontario Fruit
Belt of New York State, have worked wonders in ornamentation and economy
by planting cherry, apple, plum and other beautiful and productive trees
on the strip of land, "The Farms by the Side of the Road."
At a very small additional expense, the State could have planted every
rod of improved highway with productive trees, putting that
forethoughtful specification into the contracts.
Get out your pencil for a moment. Suppose the state had English walnuts
on the 8,000 miles, placing the trees 40 feet apart. We should have
growing then over one million productive trees and some of them would be
old enough to be bearing today. Within ten years from now, their
product would be worth at a conservative estimate $25 per tree,
representing a sum sufficient to carry one-third of the State's entire
cost of government.
The war just won for the cause of World Democracy has opened the eyes of
the American people to many things they had not before apprehended or
realized. One is the value of productive land space. Another is the
importance of our forests, and especially the value of the native
nut-bearing trees. It was discovered, when Uncle Sam scurried around to
procure a supply of black walnut for gun stocks, that the German agents
had been ahead of him. Although thickly settled, Germany finds it
profitable to employ one-fourth of its entire area in growing forest
trees. Yet it seems the Kaiser's forests were short on this valuable
timber, so they picked up all the procurable black walnut in the United
States.
This set the New York State Conservation Commissioner thinking and last
year he advised farmers to propagate and cultivate the black walnut--a
little late for the emergency; but better late than never, especially in
this case.
On my little farm near Lockport, N. Y., there is a large black walnut
tree, perhaps 90 to 100 years old. It bears a nut of unusual size, of
excellent taste and good keeping qualities. This tree has produced as
high as ten bushels of shucked nuts in a season. Twenty-two years ago,
when the importance of growing native nut trees had impressed but few
people, I did have the good sense to plant several dozen nuts from the
"Niagara King Walnut." I must confess I gave the trees little attention,
and a farm hand zealously cut down all but one of the black walnuts,
mistaking them for sumac. The survivor last year bore about three
bushels of nuts. Most interesting of all is the result of observations
as to the product, and its bearing on the question of whether or not nut
trees will reproduce "true to variety." The walnuts from the young tree
differ in shape, being almost round, while the fruit of the parent tree
is almost chestnut in form. But the flavor, thickness of shell and the
keeping qualities seem identical.
Six years ago I started a small black walnut and butternut tree nursery
for home use and from it have set out about four hundred trees along the
ditches and fences on the farm. The early plantings have attained a
height of from 12 to 15 feet. If every farmer would do likewise, he
would make a considerable addition to the country's food supply, to say
nothing of the value of the timber for coming generations when the
frees approach maturity. It has afforded me pleasure to send nut trees
to friends in various counties of the state and we shall watch with
interest, the reports on their growth and development under the many
variations of soil and climate. The butternut in many parts of the
country is rapidly disappearing. To save this beautiful tree with its
delicately flavored nuts, it will undoubtedly be necessary to take it
into extensive cultivation.
Although apart from the subject perhaps, it may be interesting to refer
to the application of forestry to a woodlot containing native nut trees.
Like many farmers who regard every tree as just a tree, useful for
timber or fire wood, I found several years ago that indiscriminate
cutting on my woodlot was destroying walnuts, along with the commoner
species of the stand. My first step was to halt the cutting of all black
walnuts, hickories, butternuts, oaks and beeches on the seven-acre
woodlot. I took an inventory of these trees and found there were 160
shagbark hickories from 10 to 25 years old, five butternuts about 20
years old, and four black walnuts about 25 years old. These, of course,
were not "tolerant trees" like the evergreens, and most of them were
rapidly deteriorating from being overcrowded by more rapidly growing and
less desirable neighbors. All _of_ them had been retarded in growth by
the crowded condition of the stand. Inaugurating a process of judicious
thinning with a view to giving the nut trees the advantage, the result
in a single season was surprising. Under the beneficent influence of
ample sun, air and root sustenance, the butternuts and black walnuts
bore fine crops for the first time, in the season following the winter
thinning process. The young hickories contented themselves with making
their first annual growth in years. And, Oh joy of realized hopes, in
this the third season since letting the sun into the native nut grove,
nearly all of the older shagbark hickories bore their first crops! And
now I have a nut plantation, that might have been ere this, burned up as
fire-wood, at no expense whatever, since the thinning out process
produced a very welcome supply of fire wood in these days of high-priced
coal.
In a recent bulletin of the United States Department of Agriculture,
"Value to Farm Families of Food, Fuel and use of House," there are some
illuminating statistics on "The Farmer's Income" and "The Farmer's
Living." It is stated that "the total average of the three items of
food, fuel and use of the house for the 950 families (selected from all
parts of the United States) is $642, and 66% of $424 of this is
furnished by the farm." The Seven Pomeroy Centennial. Trees in one year
produced a food product worth and actually sold for about $800 in one
year! The average annual production of those seven trees has been over
$600 for the last ten years. And what about the labor involved in
raising and harvesting the English walnut crop in question? Picking the
nuts from the ground, children gladly doing it and earning five cents
per basket.
Horace Greeley's undiscovered farm under the first twelve inches was a
gold mine when turned up finally; Mr. Pinchot's farm on top rescued from
flood and other devastations is worth more money than before. But how
about the strip of land along the roadside, an aggregate waste of at
least one per cent of the acreages of eastern farms? Well worth
reclaiming, and no expensive ditching, irrigation and lumbering involved
in the process either. In addition, credit must be given also to this
enterprise for the value of ornamentation of the highways and their
protection from the elements all seasons of the year.
And strange to relate, in the long list of items under the head of
"Classes of Food," given in the Federal Bulletin referred to, no mention
is made of nut foods, either native or imported nut trees. Fruits,
vegetables, meats, store groceries, everything is there but nuts.
"Nutty," do we hear someone suggest? Probably not in this audience of
enlightened nut growers, but speaking to the general public we shall
say, "Well, mebbe," like Uncle Lige of Niagara. Two bad years on the
farm, four acres of tomatoes that didn't pay for the plants, nothing but
soft corn and no potatoes compelled Uncle and Aunt Tompkins to open an
account at the corner grocery. The first month the bill came in, Aunt
Sally was all in a flutter when she audited the items: Sugar, 60;
coffee, 40; oatmeal, 50; sugar, 75; ditto, 80. "Lige, you go right back
to the store and tell that cunnin' clerk that he's charged us fer what
we never got. We ain't had no 'ditto' in this house." Lige went to the
store and returned, apparently a sadder but a wiser man. "Well, Lige,"
inquired the thrifty spouse, "Did you find out 'bout that 'ditto' we
didn't get? What did you find?" Lige picked up his pipe, remarking,
"Well Sally, I found I was a durned fool, and you _ditto_."
We are all waking up to the fact that we did not become "nutty" soon
enough. We have found that our public agencies of conservation have been
"durn fools" and farmers and other land owners "ditto", for not having
inaugurated the systematic planting of productive trees along the
highways and farm hedgerows and ditches, many years ago.
Norman Pomeroy used to say with becoming modesty that he took no credit
for planting the trees that have made such a substantial income for his
family, because "I had to be slapped in the face in the dark before I
became wise, and then the natural improvidence of mankind came near
spoiling Nature's tip when the children gratified their little stomachs
in preference to planting for the future. Men are but children of an
older growth, a wise man said. That is a true but sad doctrine. We all
live too much in the present and for the present, forgetting that the
future will soon be the present, if not for ourselves, for our children
and our children's children. It takes time to realize on trees, for the
stomach or the pocketbook. It requires sacrifice to get anything worth
while and, waiting is the hardest kind of sacrifice, especially for
people of small means. But it pays in the end."
The Northern Nut Growers' Association, is doing valuable work not only
in the study and planting of nut trees, but in its propaganda. But I
have discovered that the results of practical work and the worth of
propaganda, are hard to bring home to public agencies, like Governors
and Legislatures. The construction and maintenance _of_ public highways
are a state function. But that duty must be incomplete in our opinion
until the state finishes its job by planting productive trees along the
highways and public roads. How shall we bring this about? Adopt
resolutions? Very good.
But did the Anti-Saloon League, for example, content itself with
resolutions when it wanted real results in the halls of legislation? Not
much. Our prohibition friends were very practical. They employed trained
agents to present their cause everywhere and in every way calculated to
do the most good.
Let me repeat to you tree planters the late Norman Pomeroy's favorite
lines, as I recall them:
"_The dead are eternized in stone,_
_The living, by living shafts are known._
_Plant thou a tree and each recurring spring_
_The stirring leaves thy lasting praise shall sing._"
PRESIDENT REED: Prof. Chittenden, of Michigan Agricultural
College will address you on "Native Nut Tree Plantations for Michigan."
NATIVE NUT TREE PLANTATIONS IN MICHIGAN
PROFESSOR A. K. CHITTENDEN, MICHIGAN AGRICULTURAL COLLEGE EAST
LANSING, MICHIGAN
I am very glad of this opportunity to tell you what the Michigan
Agricultural College is doing, and what it thinks, about nut tree
plantations in this State. I want to say first, that there is a very
general interest in nut trees among the farmers and land owners of the
State. A considerable number of the letters that the Forestry Department
of the College receives from farmers are about nut culture. They seem to
be particularly interested in pecans, English walnuts, and chestnuts. A
few years ago the State was flooded with literature urging people to
plant these trees and we are still feeling the aftermath of this
campaign. Much of this state is too far north for the successful growth
of these particular trees and we therefore have advised waiting before
investing heavily in young trees, until experiments have shown where
they would succeed and what kinds it would be safe to plant. At the same
time, we suggested the planting of one or two trees of certain varieties
as an experiment. We have for the most part recommended only our native
nut trees for planting on a large scale.
We have tried many varieties of nut trees, grafted on hardy stock, at
the College, and only a few of them are alive today. All of the pecan
trees have been lost and nearly all of the English walnuts. About two
years ago, we got some of Burbank's Royal walnuts from California. All
of these trees except one, were killed back of the graft the first
winter. One of them, however, is doing well although growing very
slowly. It will doubtless succeed now, as it has pulled through two
winters, one an exceptionally cold one.
About three years ago, we bought some Sober Paragon chestnuts from an
eastern nursery which had been advertising them widely in this State.
They were all infected with the Chestnut Blight disease. Now this
disease has at the present time not appeared in Michigan, except on
imported nursery stock. We have a considerable number of chestnut
plantations in the State, and if the disease can be kept out, there is
no reason why chestnuts cannot be raised more profitably. But our
experience has shown that the trees must be raised in this State and not
brought in from outside. We have some very nice chestnut trees in our
nursery at the College which are now thirteen years old and which have
been bearing nuts for four years. This fall we are planting them all
along the drives so as to open up the crowns and induce a greater
production of nuts.
We also have some Japanese walnuts that are doing well indeed. One of
these trees on the campus is 35 years old and produces a large quantity
of nuts.
There are a number of English walnuts at various places along Lake
Michigan in the fruit belt. Individual trees will often succeed, but the
chances for success are not great enough to warrant a man putting very
much money into a plantation. There are two Sober Paragon chestnuts near
Niles which are now 12 years old and are growing and bearing well. At
the College farm, near Grand Rapids, there are some pecan trees, but
their history shows that they have been repeatedly frosted back.
I could mention a great many cases of success with individual imported
trees, but I do not know of any extensive plantations that have so far
succeeded.
There is, however, a different story to tell of our native nut trees of
which there are many successful plantations. Our native edible nuts are
black walnut, hickories and chestnut. They will grow anywhere in the
southern part of the State and along Lake Michigan. Using these trees as
a basis, I believe we can develop, if it has not already been done, a
tree that will bear an improved quality of nuts and that will be
perfectly hardy.
The black walnut is the tree that did perhaps more than any other tree
to help win the war, and, while timber raising and nut culture do not
perhaps go hand in hand, probably more black walnuts are being planted
as individual trees than any other tree in the State. The black walnut
was an invaluable tree for gun stocks and airplane propellers. The War
Department scoured the country to find trees for these purposes and
every black walnut that is now planted, may be of service to the country
in the future. The College raises thousands of black walnuts and
Japanese walnuts each year, and the demand for them is very great. When
we have in planting, a choice between two trees, one choice being a tree
suitable for shade only and the other a nut producing tree, I would say
plant the nut tree. Our trees will have a double appeal if they furnish
not only shade, but edible nuts as well. At the last session of the
State Legislature, an act was passed providing for the planting of nut
and shade trees along our highways. As a result of this act, we hope
sometime to see the highways in the southern part of the State lined
with walnut and other nut bearing trees. A tree that will serve a
double purpose should be planted wherever possible.
Tree planting is a thing in which we are all interested. Those of you
who have been abroad remember the long rows of trees, often fruit trees,
that lined the roads. In this country we cannot plant fruit trees along
our roads as there is nobody to care for them and disease would quickly
start and spread to our orchards. But nut trees can be safely planted.
We have, on certain soils in the southern part of the State, recommended
planting black walnuts for fence posts. The heart wood is very durable
and the tree grows quite rapidly under favorable conditions. Then,
perhaps when the trees are large enough for posts, the owner will decide
to keep them for the nuts and for timber production.
During the past summer the College made a study of native nut tree
plantations in the State with a view to determining the profitableness
of such plantations.
Among the older plantations studied was one in Berrien County. It was
planted 45 years ago and covers four acres. The soil is clay and loam
with a clay sub-soil. Three year old seedlings were used with an average
spacing of about 28 by 32 feet. The grove was cultivated for about 8
years after planting. The trees are now in fairly good condition but
many are affected with heart-rot. They are quite spreading and bushy in
form and are not suitable for lumber. There is now about 30 cords of
wood per acre. The average diameter is 20 inches with an average height
of 60 feet. The ground is sodded over and the grove is used for grazing
sheep. The owner says that about half the trees bear and that the June
bugs are the principal source of trouble, eating the blossoms. The yield
in nuts varies from practically nothing to 25 or 30 bushels for the
entire plantation. About six years ago, the owner reports a crop of 36
bushels, and two years ago a crop of 27 bushels. From these figures I
should say the plantation is a success.
A chestnut plantation in Van Buren County was set 37 years ago and
covers one acre of sandy soil. The plantation was cultivated for about
ten years and corn was grown between the trees. The average tree is 14
inches in diameter and 65 feet tall. The returns have been small because
the trees were planted too close together, but some years the plantation
has yielded 15 bushels of nuts. There are 67 trees on the acre, which is
too many for good nut production. The grove will produce about 20 cords
of wood or about 550 split fence posts per acre.
One of the oldest plantations in the State is 56 years old and covers
1-1/2 acres in Montcalm County. It consists of black walnuts and
chestnuts mixed together. The average black walnut is 14 inches in
diameter and 67 feet tall. The average chestnut is 20 inches in diameter
and 60 feet tall. The spacing is about 40 by 30 feet and the soil is a
gravelly sand. The yield in nuts has been quite small, six to eight
bushels a year.
There are a number of such mixed plantations in the State and it would
seem that the two trees do not do very well together. In this case, I
should say that the soil is not well suited for either tree.
There is a plantation of Japanese walnuts in Oakland County. It is five
years old and on sandy soil. About 500 trees were planted at the cost of
60 cents per tree. The stock came from Pennsylvania and was budded to
English walnut. The scions died back, however, and the plantation stock
came along so it is now a Japanese walnut grove. The average tree is
about 2 inches in diameter and 10 feet tall. The trees are very healthy
and vigorous and are beginning to bear a few nuts.
A chestnut plantation in Van Buren County is 12 years old. Two foot
transplants were used and the trees were planted at the rate of 100 to
the acre. They were cultivated for two years. The average tree is 4
inches in diameter and 20 feet high. The trees are healthy and in good
condition. The grove is yielding from one to two bushels of nuts a year
and should be thinned so as to open it up and encourage nut production.
A black walnut plantation in Ingham County, planted about 20 years ago
for timber purposes and underplanted with white cedar to force the trees
to grow straight and tall, is in excellent condition. The average tree
is 5 inches in diameter and 34 feet tall. The plantation has not yet
borne nuts but if it were opened up, would doubtless produce a large
number in a few years.
I could give more instances of nut tree plantations in the State, but I
think I have mentioned enough to show that our native nut trees can be
profitably raised. During the last few years, a great many black walnut
plantations have been established but most of them are yet too young to
be in a bearing condition. If it were not for the difficulty of getting
healthy chestnut stock, I believe Michigan would be a large producer of
these nuts.
A study has been made of the volume of the wood that could be obtained
from these chestnut plantations. Owing to the open nature of the
groves, the trees are mostly not suitable for lumber and the yield of
cordwood and posts is less than in a forest plantation where the trees
are closer together and force each other to grow straight and tall. It
was found, however, that a chestnut grove planted for nuts, would yield
on the average 13 standard cords of wood per acre at 20 years of age, 20
cords at 30 years, and 25 cords at 40 years of age. Placing the value of
this wood at present prices of $7 per cord, would give a value of $91
per acre at 20 years and $140 per acre at 30 years for the wood alone.
Probably most of the chestnut plantations have been planted for the nut
and the black walnuts for timber with the nuts as a side issue.
Black walnuts should be planted on fairly fertile, moist soil. We do not
recommend planting the nuts as squirrels are liable to dig them out. It
is better to use small trees.
The cost of establishing black walnut plantations is quite small. Native
trees can be bought for $15 per thousand one year old seedlings. We
prefer to plant these small trees as the black walnut develops a strong
tap root early in life, making it difficult to transplant large trees.
Only a comparatively small number of hickories have been planted in this
state. This is a tree that, while it grows slowly, is very valuable for
its wood and it is becoming very scarce. It should be planted more
extensively. It may well be planted in openings in the woodlot. Every
farmer knows the value of hickory and the trees can be utilized when
quite small.
It is needless to say anything about the value of black walnut wood.
High prices have been paid for standing trees and for saw logs. Many
individual trees have sold for $500 apiece and even more. Prices as high
as $120 per M board feet have been paid for standing timber.
At the present rate of cutting, it is only a question of a few years
before all of the merchantable black walnut will have been removed, and,
unless trees are planted, the black walnut will be a thing of the past.
It cannot be depended upon to reproduce itself in our forests as do the
maples, the ash, and many other trees with nonedible seed. For every
black walnut tree in our woods and along the roads, there are
innumerable small boys and squirrels who are after the nuts and the seed
have little chance of germinating even if they do get into the soil. If
there are to be black walnuts in our future forests, the trees must be
planted or the nuts planted and properly safeguarded. From a forestry
viewpoint, the black walnut is a good tree to plant. It has a high
value and the demand for the wood is very great. And, for planting,
trees should be chosen that will give a good quality nut as far as
possible.
For ornamental planting, too, nut trees may often be chosen to
advantage. For the farm yard they are often the best choice. Hickories
or black walnut are long lived trees and the hickory is very ornamental.
A great many trees have been planted by the school children of the
State; and right here is a good field for planting, around our school
houses. The average country school ground is a forlorn place, usually
barren of both grass and shade. While we perhaps cannot have a lawn, we
can certainly have shade trees, and the children will take care of them
and watch their development with interest, particularly if they have a
part in planting them. A few years ago the College distributed about
6000 trees to the schools of the state for Arbor Day and many of these
trees were black walnuts. During the last few years, the Collage has not
raised enough of these trees to meet the demand.
As memorial trees, also, nut trees are being quite extensively planted.
A great many black walnuts have been planted in the honor of our
soldiers who gave their lives in the war and it is a very suitable tree
to plant for this purpose.
Now that our forests are becoming more scarce, we are beginning to
appreciate more fully the value of their products. Nuts, extracts, maple
syrup and many minor products are obtained from our native trees. If man
could be surrounded with the right assortment of trees, he would need
little else. He would have food in the nuts and fruit; fire wood and
building material in the stems, as well as paper and clothing from the
wood pulp. He would have sugar from the sap, medicine from the bark, and
he would have wood distillates, turpentine and resin. He could live long
and well on the products of our forests.
Our forests are, however, disappearing. Our native nut trees are being
cut off. Our sugar maple orchards are being put into farm land, and
forest products are increasing rapidly in price. We have got to keep a
certain part of the country in forests in order to have the country
prosperous, and to do this we must either plant trees or so manage the
existing forests that they will renew themselves naturally. In planting
trees, we should not overlook the by-products of the trees, nuts and
syrup and bark. These products are often the main crop in themselves
and in any case, they will increase the receipts and make our forestry
work more profitable.
There are many acres in southern Michigan and along the Lake, that will
give larger returns from nut tree plantations than from any other
source. We want first to be sure that the trees are hardy to the
locality before we recommend them. I believe there is a very big future
for such plantations. The history of southern plantations has been one
of remarkable success.
We must be particularly careful in advising the establishment of nut
tree plantations. We ought to be particularly careful in not encouraging
people to buy trees that we are not sure will succeed. For every
plantation that fails means a loss of money and an obstacle to future
progress. But every tree that succeeds means an advertisement for years
to come.
I do not see any reason why southern Michigan cannot raise many improved
varieties of black walnut and perhaps some other nut trees as well. Our
study of native nut tree plantations this summer, shows that with proper
care they may be very profitable and we hope to see a great extension of
such plantations in this State.
PROF. CHITTENDEN: I would like to say that the College has been
very favorably impressed with the work that this Association has been
doing and the care that is used in recommending nut trees. It is a thing
the people need a lot of advice about. I thank you. (Applause).
MR. J. F. JONES: I would like to ask if the pecans that were
tender were northern or southern pecans.
PROF. CHITTENDEN: We got them from a nursery in New York State
and I could not say as to the source of the stock beyond that.
MR. JONES: Naturally the southern source is the cheapest tree.
PROF. CHITTENDEN: We got the trees from a nursery that had been
advertising them very extensively in Michigan. It was about five years
ago, at a time when this State had been flooded with literature from
this nursery and other nurseries about particularly pecans and
chestnuts. We were doubtful about the trees they were recommending, and
we got a considerable number and planted them out, but we took pretty
good care of them; but they all died in winter.
DR. MORRIS: It is a pity that people who do the most
advertising have to. Certain firms are not allowed to advertise in nut
journals at all. I think the public ought to be made aware of that fact.
It is a pity too, because the ones who spend the largest amount of money
in advertising are the ones of whom we ask the most questions.
In regard to Prof. Chittenden's paper, it is a very important matter to
impress upon children and others who are setting out trees the idea that
a tree is not able to care for itself as a rule. It is quite the
exception for a tree set out by itself to thrive and enter into
competition with other trees and bushes and shade, in the early years,
and insects later. I suppose the number of ordinary trees including
maples that make their way to a successful old age would not represent
one in many hundred thousands that make a start in the sprouting seed.
That fact ought to be impressed on every school child who is setting out
a tree--he really should adopt that tree and make that its own child.
And if you can inculcate the maternal and the paternal instinct along
with the setting out of from one to six children of these other
children, you will then get trees on your roadsides and your waste
lands, and without a great amount of difficulty. But you have got to go
back to first principles there and realize that very few trees are able
to succeed after they have been set out unless they receive a great deal
of care subsequently. Those of us who give a great deal of attention to
trees, who pretend to care for our trees, will lose a percentage so
large that I would hardly dare state what it probably is. Among the
hundreds and thousands of trees I have set out, all from reputable
nurserymen or raised by myself; I doubt if 25% are alive today, and I
have pretty good success too. This is not to discourage anyone; it is to
encourage people, and they are to be encouraged by knowing the facts;
and when all the final facts are known about the values of trees that
are given proper attention, then people will be willing to give them
that degree of attention. Not until then are we to have success in
filling our waste lands with nut trees.
Prof. Chittenden brought up one point of a great deal of consequence. In
any locality plant the species which belong to that locality. The
species which, by natural selection and adaptation have fitted
themselves to the environment are, as a rule, the trees which will do
best in that locality. That is a principle I think which ought to be
thoroughly well fixed in mind. One may experiment with any number of
trees from a distance, but the trees which naturally have adapted
themselves to a locality, the species which have done that are the
species upon which we can expend our efforts to the best advantage.
In the matter of chestnut blight, we assume that the chestnut blight
will act like measles blight, scarlet fever blight, or any other
epidemic. In other words, it is due to a microbe, it is due to a
peculiar microbic group, a peculiar family group which happened to
start out in northern China on its invasion and got to this country
where it found trees which were not resistant. The American and European
trees are not resistant. Wherever it has gone from northern China, from
the place where blight, the tree host and enemy grew up side by side,
and represented the survival of the fittest; wherever it has gone away
from the place where we have the survival of the fittest, at any rate as
a result of struggle, there it has found susceptible individuals that it
has destroyed. When a blight of any sort sets out, chestnut blight,
measles, scarlet fever--any blight you please, you are talking natural
history, you are taking biology, about an animal or a plant, about a
microbe, a living thing. All of these living things run out of their
vital energy in time. Each microbe runs out of its energy just as a
breed of horses or of strawberries runs out of its energy. All
varieties, varietal types, run out of their natural energy, so that it
is simply a question of length of time before this family microbe or
family group of this microbe will lose its energy. We do not know how
many years that will be. It may be a great many years, and by that time,
our chestnuts may practically have disappeared. We can find here and
there a tree which resists better than others do, and we may find some
with enough resistance to be worthy of propagation as of that resistant
kind. We know that several species resist the blight very well. I found
four species that resist the blight very well among six kinds I have
tried out on my place. But some chestnuts bear so early and heavily that
we may afford to set them out, even in the presence of blight, trimming
them back and looking after them carefully: For instance, a number of
Sober Paragon chestnuts that I planted all died but one that is near the
house. It bears so heavily that it is well worth while, and it simply
means that one must give a great deal of attention to it. Some people
can afford even to set out the Paragon because of its high bearing
power. I have a number of hybrids which resist the blight very well. The
cross between the American chestnut and the Japanese, or between the
common American chestnut and the chinquapins showed the resistance very
largely of the resistant parent. But curiously enough, the ones which
look most like the American chestnut also carry that parent's weakness
in regard to blight, so that all of my hybrids between the American
chestnut and the resistant kinds which look like the American chestnut
and act like it also catch the same microbe for the most part. But one
of the hybrids does not. No. 2 which I have given Mr. Jones, is very
much like the American chestnut. It grows vigorously, acts like it, and
looks like it, and it has not blighted up to the ninth year of age,
beginning to bear about the fourth year. Most of those that are like the
chinquapin or like the Chinese chestnut resist blight very well.
About Japanese walnuts. If Prof. Chittenden has a large number of
Japanese walnuts about the state, he may very well select one or two of
the very best and advise the owners to top work the others with the one
or two which happen to be particularly good. Most of the Japanese
walnuts are small. Most of them are Siebold type instead of the heart
nut variety, but a few very large ones will be found here and there and
of high quality, and they graft almost as easily as peaches.
In regard to Persian walnuts. If there are a few trees here and there
about the state, we need not fear the question of introducing others
because it is too far north. If you simply have one tree that is a good
one, that is enough, because you can graft over all sorts of black
walnuts, Japanese walnut and Persian walnut stocks with the one or two
trees which are known to be good in Michigan. One good tree in the state
which is bearing good nuts of desirable qualities is enough. Graft all
of your other walnuts back from it. And in setting out the native black
walnuts, chestnuts and the hickories of different species, it is
important always to distinguish in regard to intention--whether they are
to be for forest purposes or for nut purposes. That is not always clear
in the minds of a number of people whom I have seen setting out groves
of these trees. They talk about getting timber and nuts. You can not get
both profitably. I think people ought to be impressed with the fact that
if they are setting out apple trees for timber they would set them five
or six feet apart. If they are setting them out for apples, they would
set them sixty feet apart. Precisely the same thing is true of nut
trees. (Applause).
MR. JONES: I would like to ask Dr. Morris how he protects
grafts the first year. Grafts growing the first year are very tender,
put in late, and they will often winter kill in the tree that is
perfectly hardy otherwise.
DR. MORRIS: Mr. Jones is quite right about that, and that is a
matter requiring more experience than I have at the present time. What I
have done in the way of protection fairly well is this: For instance, if
I graft Persian walnut on black walnut and it makes a late start and
then in September has a very sappy growth, or in October has a sappy
growth of three or four or five feet (they grow tremendously fast, like
weeds) if the bark at the base of the graft is brown or has two or
three buds that are brown or partially ripened, I cut off four or five
of the first leaves and let them harden. Then in the fall I cut off all
but those four or five buds and put wax over the end. That is the way I
avoid the winter killing of the sappy growth. As soon as the part
nearest the grafted place begins to turn brown, looks like hardening up
and two or three buds are pretty hard, I cut off four or five of those
leaves right there and let the buds ripen, and those buds will ripen
very well. I will sacrifice five or six buds for the sake of saving
three or four buds. The next year they grow all right. That is not a
nice way, but when you see you are going to lose a thing on account of
sappiness, that will sometimes work.
MR. JONES: I generally wrap the base of the limb in burlap.
DR. MORRIS: If the sappy tip dies, it poisons the rest. There
are poisonous enzymes that poison the rest of it.
MR. BIXBY: I was going to ask Prof. Chittenden if he could give
any experience with the named varieties of black walnuts.
PROF. CHITTENDEN: I don't think I could distinguish between the
varieties of black walnut that have been planted in this state. That is
not a thing that I feel able to discuss. I know that a number of
different varieties of black walnut have been planted. At the College we
have done a good deal of grafting on the black walnuts, and we have not
had very good success.
MR. BIXBY: I had in mind improved varieties of black walnut
grafted on the black walnut stock.
PROF. CHITTENDEN: I don't think we have had any experience of
that. We always get a good deal of wood from Pennsylvania in the spring
and do the grafting in class. We can not expect a very high grade of
work when the students do it as a part of their work of instruction.
There are some black walnuts in the state that have very good nuts, and
some that have not. I have tried to get for our nursery good nuts from
trees that had a good native nut. We have had so much difficulty getting
black walnuts at all the last few years that we have taken just what we
could get. We get nuts from all over the central part of the state and
plant in the nursery to get our seedling trees.
MR. BIXBY: I have found some of the named varieties of black
walnuts bearing in quite a number of sections of this state and other
states. They seem to bear quite young.
PRESIDENT REED: Mr. Jones has partly prepared a paper on
"Pecans other than those of the well known sections," but as it has
been impossible to complete it, it will be handed to the secretary
later, and inserted in the proceedings.
PECANS OTHER THAN THOSE OF THE WELL KNOWN SECTIONS
J. F. JONES, LANCASTER, PENNSYLVANIA
Pecans have been grown in the South for a good many years, and, with the
advent of budded and grafted trees of superior varieties in more recent
years, the industry made great strides and now that the product of some
of these grafted orchards is coming on the market and selling readily at
high prices, the economic value and importance of the pecan is becoming
to be more fully appreciated.
The success of the pecan in the South, led some planters in the northern
states to make experimental plantings of these southern varieties but
they have proven disappointing, as might be expected, since our seasons
are too short for the nuts to mature, even where the trees are hardy. I
have seen the Stuart, one of the largest southern pecans, when grown in
Lancaster and Adams Counties, Pa., not half as large as the Indiana
sorts and with little or no kernel. The Schley, one of the finest
southern pecans, when grown in Adams Co., Pa., is so small that no one
would recognize it and it has no kernel at all.
In very recent years, largely through the efforts of a few progressive
men in Indiana, fine varieties of the pecan have been discovered in
Indiana and Kentucky, and these varieties are being propagated and
planted over the northern states generally. While the discovery of these
varieties and their propagation marked a big step forward in extending
the cultural range of the pecan and making it possible to grow this nut
several hundred miles north of the southern pecan belt, not unlike the
southern varieties, the Indiana and Kentucky varieties are necessarily
limited in their range of adaptability, and it is perhaps not safe to
recommend them for planting, except possibly in the more favored
localities, north of the 40th parallel and south thereof and possibly in
the elevated or mountain sections they should not be recommended for
planting north of latitude 38 degrees. The advantages of securing
varieties for propagation therefore from as far north as possible is
obvious.
I have examined a good many sample pecans from Missouri and Kansas, some
of which are excellent, but, aside from possibly being a little hardier
in tree, they have no advantage over the fine Indiana and Kentucky
varieties that we already have, unless of course, they should be better
adapted to planting in the western states.
In its natural range, the pecan is found growing farther north along the
Mississippi River, in Iowa and Illinois, than anywhere else in the
country, and naturally we turned to these pecan forests hoping to find a
variety bearing nuts of a size and quality to merit propagation and
dissemination north of the belt where it is safe to recommend the
planting of the Indiana varieties. As a result of correspondence with an
Iowa nurseryman in the fall of 1914, I engaged the services of a
competent man to gather pecans for me at Muscatine, Iowa. Following my
instructions, this man searched the woods in that locality to find what
I wanted for propagation and as a result, nuts were sent me from several
trees which were carefully marked so that in case scions were wanted
from any of the trees, they would be readily identified. This man seemed
to be very enthusiastic about the nuts he sent me, and, as he had made a
business of gathering pecans, and he knew the pecans in that section
well, I felt that he had sent me the best that he had there. None of the
pecans sent had sufficient size and merit to propagate however, and I
gave the matter up. Fortunately, Mr. G. H. Corsan, Toronto, Canada, was
endeavoring the same fall or winter to get pecans to grow trees that
would succeed in Canada and he bought pecans from a dealer in
Burlington, Iowa. Upon receiving this lot of nuts, Mr. Corsan was
astonished at their large size, as he expected that pecans from the
northern limit of the pecan to be of small size. Thinking that this
party had sent him southern pecans, Mr. Corsan wrote him at once that he
did not want southern pecans, explaining that he wanted them for
planting. This party replied that the nuts sent him were genuine Iowa
pecans. Knowing my interest in the matter, Mr. Corsan wrote me during
the spring of 1915, giving me the facts in the case and urged that I go
to Burlington the next fall and look up a variety for propagation. Fall
came on, but with it, so much to do and with short help, due to war
conditions, that I had to give up the trip, but, at Mr. Corsan's
suggestion, I took the matter up with Mr. Ed. G. Marquardt, Burlington,
Iowa, with the result that the matter was placed in his hands, with the
assurance from Mr. Marquardt that he would do the very best he could for
us. Mr. Marquardt employed a man who had made a business of gathering
pecans there and who knew the trees bearing the largest nuts, and with
the help of this man, finally located a tree 20 miles north of
Burlington bearing very large pecans of thin shell and splendid quality.
Although most of the nuts had been gathered, the husks on the ground
indicated it had been bearing good crops. This tree was marked and some
of the nuts sent to me. These pecans I considered remarkably fine for so
far north. They were fully as large as the Indiana, with even a thinner
shell and a full kernel of excellent quality. With the help of Mr.
Marquardt, scions were secured from this tree the following spring, and
grafting proved very successful, which we consider very fortunate, as
this land was cleared during the war and this tree met the fate of
others, being turned into lumber and it is no more.
This variety has been given Mr. Marquardt's name. Coming from 20 miles
north of Burlington, Iowa, in north latitude 41 degrees, I shall expect
the Marquardt to succeed any where south of the Great Lakes. The Indiana
and Busseron pecans originated farther north than any others of the
Indiana group, the original trees of which are growing in the Wabash
River bottom, west of Oaktown, Ind., about 10 miles south of latitude
39. Most of the Indiana and Kentucky varieties are from latitude 38
degrees, or approximately 200 miles south of where the Marquardt
originated. The climate of Iowa is also considerably colder than is the
same latitude farther east, due to the more open character of the
country west and to the influence of the Great Lakes farther east. The
pecans there are not only necessarily hardier, but have to mature their
fruit in a shorter season, which is all important in a variety for
northern planting, as it has been shown that the pecan is hardy in tree
considerably north of where it will mature its fruit properly. Realizing
the importance of the Iowa pecans for northern planting and realizing
the building of the big power dam on the Mississippi River at Keokuk,
Iowa, and the consequent raising of the water level for considerable
distance up the river together with building of levees and clearing of
the forests, threatened the destruction of many of the pecan trees and
pecan forests, Mr. Bixby spent nearly a week during the past fall in the
pecan forests and groves along the Mississippi River around Clinton,
Ia., and Burlington, Ia. The facts of the following paragraphs (except
the last two) I have taken from his notes:
These pecan trees at Clinton, Iowa, are the most northerly growing of
the native pecans so far discovered. They are on the islands in the
river and on the bottom lands, where the land at low water is only a few
feet above the water level, and at high water, several feet under water.
The trees certainly are not suffering from lack of moisture. The soil is
alluvial, seemingly of unknown depths and must be very fertile,
enriched as it is by the deposits left by the high waters each year, or
sometimes, several times a year. No pecan trees under six inches in
diameter were seen here, and they ranged from that size up to 24 inches
in trunk diameter 85 feet tall. No trees bearing large pecan nuts were
seen, although the flavor of the kernels of practically all of the trees
was good. Crops of nuts were irregular and seemingly not so good as they
were some years. None of the trees near Clinton were deemed worthy of
propagation.
The pecans at Burlington are growing under similar conditions to those
at Clinton, but they are much more numerous, there being thousands of
them, some being larger than any seen at Clinton. Four trees, including
the Marquardt, have been discovered and brought to the attention of the
association by Mr. Ed. G. Marquardt and Mr. John H. Witte of Burlington.
Cuts of these nuts, natural size, are shown opposite page 48. The
Marquardt is being propagated by me and the other three varieties by
Snyder Bros., Center Point, Iowa.
From the appearance of the leaves, buds and habit of growth of the
Marquardt pecan, it seemed to me that the tree had hickory blood in it,
although the nut did not suggest it; and I intended to look into this
matter fully, on a trip to Iowa the past fall, but finding I could not
go, I gave Mr. Bixby samples of the nuts, leaves and twigs and told him
what I expected, and he had this in mind during his trip. He never found
young pecan trees growing in the woods but did find them growing in
large numbers on the levees and on the edges of cultivated fields. A
careful examination showed a very considerable variation in leaf, bud
and habit of growth and there seemed little question but that there were
among them many hybrids between the pecan and the big bottom shellbark,
_Carya laciniosa_, which is found growing on the bottom lands and the
islands along with the pecan. As a matter of fact, two of the four Iowa
pecans selected for propagation, the Burlington and the Greenbay, show
unmistakable evidence of hybrid parentage in the nut, in the leaves and
buds. The Marquardt gives no hint of such parentage in the nut, but the
leaves and buds do suggest that it has hickory blood in its make up, and
it is believed that this is so. The Witte is seemingly a pure pecan.
There has recently been much done near Burlington in reclaiming
valuable, cultivatable lands from the river which formerly overflowed
them each year so that people were afraid to plant crops and they were
therefore abandoned to the forests. Levees have recently been built to
keep the water off these lands in time of high water. Drainage ditches
have been made behind them and pumping plants put in to pump the water
out of them. The cost of these improvements, which has given to
cultivation much very fertile land, has been assessed on the owners of
the lands benefited, as is also the upkeep expense. Many owners had not
the money to pay the assessments and have sold the land to those who are
clearing off the timber. This means the clearing of thousands of acres
of bottom land and the pecan is one of the principle trees on these
bottom lands. This condition makes it necessary to locate and propagate
at once, the best and most promising of these Iowa pecans and hybrids
and observe their behavior afterwards in the young trees, instead of
depending on the watching of the behavior of the original trees as has
been the case in Indiana.
I feel reluctant to close this address without mentioning the good work
done by Secretaries Deming and Bixby and other members of this
Association in searching for varieties of nuts that may be superior to
what we already have. Those of us who are propagating these trees, while
we may feel the inspiration that comes from doing a work that benefits
mankind, nevertheless, we hope and expect to make dollars and cents out
of growing these trees, while this is not the case with some of the
members of this Association who are not nurserymen and who do not expect
to enter this field.
Dr. Deming, former Secretary of this Association, did much good work and
secured some fine nuts worthy of propagation, through advertising and
the offering of premiums, and Mr. Bixby, who very kindly took up this
work when Dr. Deming was called to the colors, has been active and is
doing a great work for northern nut culture.
PRESIDENT REED: We will now have a grafting demonstration by
Mr. Jones.
Mr. Jones had brought with him specimens of stock, scions and all the
materials and tools needed for the demonstration, and performed the
various operations of grafting and budding before the audience.
MR. JONES: We often use scions half or three-fourths of an inch
in diameter, for grafting, but they are rather hard to get. In top
working, we generally take limbs two to four inches in diameter, cut
them off, and split the bark. The nut grafting must all be done late
when the sap is up in the trees. Cut the scions all on one side. Split
the bark, slip in the scion, tie up and wax the whole scion over with
grafting wax, put it on hot and seal it up tight. Sometimes for winter
protection of the English walnut as far north as Michigan your tip might
kill back because it grows so very fast and is sappy. I have never
[Illustration: PECANS FROM BURLINGTON, IA]
had trees kill in that way, but I do have many people write me that they
have trees killed in that way. In nursery grafting, we usually use just
the cleft method. You should cut the cleft on one side and don't split
it, but keep it smooth all the way through.
PRESIDENT REED: You get better results, Mr. Jones, from waxing
the entire scion?
MR. JONES: Yes, we get better results that way. In the South we
have no success at all that way; we have to cover them with sacks.
VOICE: About what degree of heat is best for the wax?
MR. JONES: Don't have it too hot and it can't burn. You can
tell that by the wax smoking.
PRESIDENT REED: As long as the wax does not smoke, it is pretty
safe.
MR. JONES: This illustrates what we call a side graft. Put the
scion in the side and leave the top on. You can also do it in bark
grafting. Cut your bark, split it, and stick your scion straight down as
it is here.
VOICE: How do you apply the hot wax?
MR. JONES: With a swab or brush. We use a carbon heater and
that makes it about the right temperature.
VOICE: How large black walnut trees could be top worked to
English walnuts?
MR. JONES: You can work almost any sized tree, but it is quite
a job in the large tree. Take a tree larger than six inches in diameter,
or eight, and it would not be very satisfactory. In cutting the scions
be careful to make a straight surface on the cut bevel. To do that the
knife should be held at an angle lengthwise to the scion. In our
grafting in the South we leave the scion dry and cover it with a bag.
That was in Florida.
DR. MORRIS: That is a very interesting question about the
limits of our using the method of covering the scion and all with the
wax. I shall speak of that in my own grafting demonstration which is
short. I got the point from Mr. Jones, and Mr. Jones tells me he got it
from Mr. Riehl. They use black wax and hard, strong wax.
MR. JONES: Mr. Riehl uses a liquid wax, resin and beeswax
without the coloring matter. We use the coloring matter to toughen the
wax.
DR. MORRIS: Still, that is amber. Amber will cut out light, and
it seems to me that it is a matter of a good deal of consequence, the
black or amber wax covering the graft completely, buds and all, wound,
scion, stock. It succeeds in the North, succeeds better than any other
method in grafting, and yet in the South it does not succeed. It is
possible that as you get further south the longer sun, the hotter sun
scalds the cambium layer of bark beneath when it would not do so in the
North. That is at least worth thinking about. In my own work during the
past year I have used transparent paraffin alone, nothing else. I have
tried different kinds of paraffin, the Parowax, the common one that the
women put up preserves with is the one that will stay on best, will not
crack and is perfectly transparent, allowing the light of the sun to act
upon the chlorophyl, in the bark and the bud and intensify the activity
of that part of the plant that depends upon light transformation by
means of chlorophyl. I am very much interested to know if this will not
succeed in the South. Paraffin would not attract the heat of the sun,
and it is possible that this will allow us to carry the method of Mr.
Jones, the best method to date, still farther south.
MR. JONES: I think, Doctor, it is a matter of heat, because in
the shade you can graft them almost any way. Do you cover the scion with
paraffin or only the union?
DR. MORRIS: I cover the entire thing with paraffin, scions,
buds and all including the wrapping. I don't leave anything exposed to
the air. There are several principles involved there. In the first place
you have the effect of light upon chlorophyl which is important; in the
second place, the melted paraffin fills all interstices in which sap
would collect and ferment. If those interstices are filled with melted
paraffin, sap will not collect there and ferment. The microbes of
bacterial and fungus origin, that prevent union and break down the
products of repair that are thrown out for the purpose of repair, can
not do it if they can not collect in quantity, and the paraffin fills
the space in which they would collect in quantity; so that does away
with another one of the dangers. In the third place, you have the same
sap tension maintained in the scion as in the stock. The difference
between the negative and positive pressures, day and night, is very
great in spring time, and as the sap responds between day and night in
the stock, it puts a strain upon the scion. The scion can not follow the
stock with its sap movement ordinarily. But if scion and stock are
covered completely with paraffin, the tension remains the same, so that
you do away with the shock of varying negative and positive pressures.
That is an important point, it seems to me, in principle in the matter
of using the paraffin. Another point is this. You prevent evaporation
from scion that goes on ordinarily through the little breathing
lenticels, the little apertures between the cells of the bark which
allow moisture to escape as well as to enter. One would naturally
believe the paraffin would fill these and smother the scion, and I
presume it is that fear which has prevented the world from trying this
for the past ten thousand years, because they were skilful grafters in
Egypt, both in the tree world and the financial world, in the days of
Hammurabi there were skilful grafters in both worlds two or three
thousand years before Christ. I suppose that fear of closing the
breathing apertures in the stock has prevented people from adopting this
method; but it is not justified, because those bold, brave nurserymen
who are not afraid to smother a scion find that all the scions live. It
is a venture into the unknown, that dramatic book, in the way of
dramatically constructive progress. Another point: When you protect your
graft in the ordinary way with ordinary wrapping, ordinary wax, the
scion becomes timid, the stock becomes timid. It is not quite sure of
itself in many cases, and when it is not sure of itself, when it has a
fear, what does it do? It resorts to the protection method. What is the
first? Suberization, cork layer formation. So the frightened stock
throws cork cells over its cut surface between that and the graft, and
the suberization goes on as a result of fear on the part of the timid
stock. When you have taken away the fear by covering the whole area with
melted paraffin and it feels safe, then suberization does not go on in
this way, your stock is not frightened, you have not a scared tree at
all, and it will go on kindly and gently as a Jersey heifer to do its
work.
PRESIDENT REED: I would like to ask Dr. Morris about that
myself. I am very much interested in the line of grafting, as we graft
50,000 to 100,000 every spring, using this same method. I feel as Mr.
Jones does, that the losses from grafting are largely due to heat and
the fermentation of sap. We find perhaps, that the first week of
grafting in cherry, we can almost invariably secure a fairly good stand.
Following that it tapers as the warmth and air increase, although the
scions are kept in cold storage, perfectly dormant, the sap is coming
up, and the increased rays of the sun--we get a very small percentage,
and it seems to become less every day, and we have always used the dark
wax. While I have been using paraffin wax a good deal of the time, I put
lampblack in it for coloring.
DR. MORRIS: I have until this year. In order to get Mr. Jones'
points, I tried to work out the philosophy of the subject and see what
values there are, what meanings in the methods which led to his success.
Then following that line of investigation, I stopped into another line
of observation, and arrived at the transparent paraffin method, so that
this is the first year in which I have tried it, but the results are
perfectly remarkable. I have only done it for a year, but you will see
100% of catches on almost everything, hickories, walnuts, hazels. I must
tell you of one very remarkable incident. Mrs. Morris had some dwarf
trees set out on the slope of the lawn, dwarf pear trees. One of my men
cut one of them off with a lawn mower the latter part of August. The top
kicked around under foot for three or four days, wilted in the sun. We
were walking past it along in August. I think Mr. Bixby said, "Why don't
you try grafting on that kind of material?" I said, "I will, blessed if
I don't." So I cut three pear scions from this wilted top that had been
cut by the lawnmower in August, and I put them on a scrub pear tree
under the fence near the house. And I tried this paraffin method, and in
about six days one of them started out a shoot, and I said to one of my
men, "We will transplant this. This is no place for it." I meant in the
spring, or in a year or so. He transplanted it the next day. And it grew
I think about half an inch after that, made good wood to last through
the winter. So I don't know what the limitations of this paraffin method
are. But that is a thing I would hardly dare tell about unless there
were men here in this room who had seen it. That little pear top, cut
off by mistake, kicked about under foot a few days in August, no sort of
scion that any one would ever think of using as a graft, put it in as a
joke, and with the further abuse of being transplanted; but it started
growth, and now it is going to be a good pear tree.
MR. JONES: The kicking around only made it good for grafting.
PRESIDENT REED: Perhaps it ripened up to a certain extent by
that drying out, like it would in the fall.
DR. MORRIS: Maybe, but I have never heard of horticulturists
propagating trees in that way and transplanting them in the same year,
and having the new wood from the graft harden for the winter.
MR. JONES: Mr. Reed spoke of grafting a cherry. You cut the top
off didn't you?
PRESIDENT REED: Yes.
MR. JONES: We graft filberts by leaving the top on and cut the
graft in on the side and wax it over. We leave it there two weeks,
maybe, and cut it off, and we get perfect stands that way, and you would
on the cherry.
PRESIDENT REED: We use the side grafting, but we cut the top
off.
MR. VOLLERTSEN: I would like to ask Dr. Morris with regard to
the stock. Don't you think the fact that that tree was moved at the time
it was, so soon after grafting, had something to do with the retarding
of the sap and causing the tree to mature the wood it did in place of
making more growth?
DR. MORRIS: That might be. All of the expert horticultural
opinions brought to bear on this are valuable. Every suggestion that has
been made has had a meaning. It requires explanation.
PRESIDENT REED: If there is nothing further along that line, we
have with us Mr. Conrad Vollertsen, of Rochester, who has been asked to
prepare a paper; and we would like to hear from him. He is an expert in
the filbert, and I believe can give us some valuable information.
(Applause).
HAZEL NUTS AND FILBERTS
CONRAD VOLLERTSEN, ROCHESTER, N. Y.
Mr. President, Ladies and Gentlemen of this Convention: I have been
approached by a member of the Northern Nut Growers' Association to
prepare a paper to be read at this convention on the growing,
cultivating, and propagating of the European hazel, together with such
other topics on the subject, as would be of interest to the members of
this association, particularly my experience and observations during the
last three or four seasons in my hazel orchard and nursery.
Now, Ladies and Gentlemen, I am not a public speaker nor a public
writer; my business is nursery and garden work; I can use spade and pick
more freely than pen and ink, and, therefore, fear that I am not the
right party called upon, knowing as I do, that we have members in this
association far more capable and experienced, and who possess more
knowledge about the European hazel than ever I had. Nevertheless as the
growing and planting of the European hazel in the eastern and middle
states of our country so far, both for ornamental or commercial
purposes, has been more or less experimental, I think all practical
information on the subject should be welcomed, and therefore I have
consented to prepare this paper and hope it will be accepted for what it
stands.
A number of years ago, after leaving school, I entered a large nursery
and garden establishment in Germany, as an apprentice boy, to learn the
garden business, to become a gardener and horticulturist, to learn how
to raise trees and other plants, to learn how to graft, to prune and
cultivate, and, in general, to take care of all kinds of growing plants.
One of the first duties bestowed upon me in my new place was the charge
of a large plot of young hazel or filbert plants. To prune or graft
them? Not at all. At that time I did not know anything about such
skilled labor. I was merely told to weed and hoe them and to keep them
clean. It was not just very elegant work, but, ladies and gentlemen, I
enjoyed very much indeed, every minute so employed among those young
filbert bushes. I became really attached to them and knew practically
every plant in the plot, and almost believe they knew me, too.
Now what was the reason for this immense pleasure I found in working
among those plants? Was it perhaps from the commercial or financial
point of view, the future income from them for fruit or when the plants
reached a saleable age? Not at all. I was then too much of a boy and did
not comprehend such a thing as that. It was merely the fond and pleasant
recollection of my childhood, of my boyhood, when, together with other
children, in the proper season, we went hunting for the common hazel
nuts, the _Corylus avellana_, as the gathering of these nuts is one of
the greatest pleasures of the German country child, and to roam through
fields and woods in late summer in those beautiful September days, when
the foliage of trees and bushes begin to color, when the birds of the
garden, field and forest begin to assemble for future migration, when
goldenrod, asters and other field flowers are reaching their greatest
beauty, then, ladies and gentlemen, the hazelnut has reached maturity.
The nut itself is a very beautiful brown color, the outer bark a golden
yellow, the leaves of the plants slightly colored with bronze, pink or
yellow, a most beautiful combination, a pleasure to look upon, and a
sight never to be forgotten. Whoever has had an opportunity to see and
admire a well fruited hazel plant, at the time of maturity, will agree
with me that it is a thing of beauty, not only during the fruit bearing
season, but in fact throughout the whole winter, with the handsome
staminate flowers or catkins appearing very abundantly in early fall,
and remaining throughout the winter, until late spring. Of all these
pleasures, these beautiful sights, etc., of which a vivid and fond
recollection caused all the pleasures in cultivating the above mentioned
hazel lot, we need not be deprived in our otherwise so richly blest
country. It is true that, at the present time, we have no American
native hazel, that can fully compete with the better European varieties,
but we hope that in time not far off, through scientific hybridization,
such will be produced. For the time being, we have some very fine
European varieties as a substitute, which for years have stood the test
very well, and should be planted wherever a place can be spared for a
few of them, and great pleasure and enjoyment will be the result. So
much for the pleasure of raising hazel nuts. I have related the
foregoing merely to show the lasting pleasure and enjoyments derived
from the planting, cultivating and gathering of a few European hazel
nuts.
But to raise hazel nuts for the pleasure of it only, would be a very
poor business proposition, and certainly not a paying one. What we
should do is to raise them in large quantities, for commercial purposes,
but here it seems to me the question should be asked: Have we had
experience enough as to recommend the planting of them in the middle and
eastern states for commercial purposes? In other words, is it worth
while to plant them with that point in view? Now, gentlemen, I do not
suppose that any one of us, at the present time, would be fully capable
or prepared to answer this question intelligently or positively, as the
planting of the hazel, for commercial purposes, has not been tried long
enough, at least not in the eastern or middle states, to warrant a
positive opinion on the subject. A great deal depends upon the variety
planted, also the location where the planting is done. Much observation
and experimenting is still required.
I have growing on my ground in western New York, near Rochester, several
hundred trees or bushes, 6 to 8 years old, about 20 varieties, most of
them German varieties, a few from France, and a few from England. They
have been bearing nuts the last four seasons, and all have reached
maturity perfectly. The smaller and medium sized nuts appeared to bear a
little better than the larger varieties. The varieties received from
France have, so far, not done well with me, as the German varieties.
They are poor bearers. In the fall of 1917, I gathered from each 5 to 6
year old tree, of the German variety, about a pound and a quarter of the
medium sized nuts, while hardly a pound from the larger fruited
varieties (same sized plants) ripened well. I was then under the
impression that the hazel not only could but should be planted in large
numbers for commercial purpose. In the fall of 1918 my crop of nuts was
very much less, and I had expected even a better harvest than in 1917,
which certainly was discouraging to me. The plants themselves were
growing beautifully, but most of the staminate blossoms or catkins were
frozen, and, consequently, very little pollenizing was accomplished, and
very little fruit the result. Such and possibly other occurrences, from
time to time we may expect and look for, and should be ready to
investigate thoroughly, before we can advocate or recommend the planting
of the hazel extensively.
It really seems strange that while the hazel generally is at home in the
northern latitudes, it should partly freeze when the thermometer reaches
say about 12 to 18 degrees below zero, and, as I had never noticed that
before, it then occurred to me that possibly another reason could be
found, why so many of the catkins were frozen.
Through my investigation in the spring of 1918, I have come to the
conclusion that the unusually wet season in our vicinity of western New
York throughout 1917 caused the hazel plants to grow until the real cold
weather was upon them, which gave the wood a very poor chance to ripen,
particularly the terminal buds, where a great many of the catkins had
formed, and caused not only them to freeze but also a certain part of
the wood. Only the lower and more protected catkins came through the
winter alright and caused what little pollenizing was done, hence the
very light harvest in the fall of 1918.
Should the results of my investigation prove true, and the continuance
of the wet weather prove the main cause of freezing so many catkins,
then it seems to me there is nothing to be alarmed about, and the
planting of the European hazel, at least in this vicinity, for
commercial purposes could be conscientiously recommended, and should be
done, the sooner the better. We do not expect our apple or pear orchards
to bear an abundant crop every year, and we should not expect it of our
hazel orchards. Something will occasionally happen to them as well as to
other crops, otherwise we run no risk whatever.
My trees or bushes, several hundred in number, planted in 1912 and
later, have stood all kinds of weather, extreme cold, very hot,
continuous wet, and still are growing most beautifully at the present
time. They gave a very satisfactory crop of nuts this last fall, 1919,
in spite of severe freezing weather on April 25th and 26th when the
mercury dropped to 12 to 15 degrees, and all hazel bushes in full bloom.
At the present time the prospect for a good crop of nuts next season is
certainly very bright.
Neither fungus, blight, or other diseases of any kind, or troublesome
insects have so far been detected. In planting the hazel for commercial
purposes, I should recommend 12 feet distance between the plants each
way, as they require abundant sun and air. At the same time, there is an
opportunity to use the land between the rows for several years to come,
as low growing crops like potatoes, strawberries, beans, beets, carrots,
etc., could be grown there to great advantage, and the cultivation of
these crops would be amply sufficient for the hazel plants.
Now the selection of varieties to be planted for the commercial hazel
orchard is a very important part of the undertaking, and should be well
considered. To plant several varieties is absolutely necessary on
account of pollenizing, as staminate and pistillate flowers, though on
the same plant, do not always appear together in proper condition on all
plants; in fact it has been proven in my orchard that sometimes plants
bring forth a great many pistillate blossoms and not a single staminate
one on them, and still a good crop of nuts were grown on them. Here the
pollination must have taken place with the pollen from other nearby
plants conveyed to them by wind or insects. One particular plant of the
zellernut type grown in one of my city lots during the last season was
very well filled with pistillate blossoms and not one catkin on it, and
still it ripened a fairly good crop of perfect nuts, where the nearest
plants filled with staminate blossoms was at least 30 feet from it. Here
it is shown and proven that a number of varieties is a necessity.
But what varieties we shall choose, will undoubtedly be an open question
for some time to come, and, no doubt, a great deal of experimental work
will have to be done to finally select the right varieties for the
different localities, the variation of temperature and location has very
much to do with the proper selection of varieties. I have among my
varieties some I could recommend and again others that are not at all
satisfactory, at least not so far, and it requires more close
observation before the very best of them can be picked out or selected.
Our next operation in the hazel will be the pruning. Here I should say
above all things: "_Keep the suckers away._" Hazel bushes are naturally
inclined to produce a great many suckers, which should be thoroughly
removed as soon as they appear; it will stop when the plants grow older.
Besides the suckers, all weak and unnecessary wood should be removed
entirely, not cut back. Our aim should be to try and get as near as
possible low standard trees, with trunk say 10 to 15 inches high and the
tree itself not to exceed 15 to 18 feet in height with the center kept
open all the time. To accomplish this, I should suggest the removing of
all crowding limbs from the center, regardless of their being
fruit-bearing limbs, which to determine is mostly guess-work at the
best. In order to keep the plants within 15 to 18 feet in height, the
terminal shoots also should be removed or reduced as the case may be,
beginning at the time of planting until the desired height is reached.
After that, one or more of the old limbs may from time to time be
removed, as there always will be enough young branches to take their
places. Such pruning in my orchard, so far, has proved sufficient, as
blight has never made its appearance in my nursery.
I will not be able to say much about blight. I have known trees in our
city, 4 or 5 varieties, for more than 30 years, bearing more or less
fruit year after year, and have never noticed any blight or anything
wrong with them. Should blight appear, I should remove all affected
limbs to the sound and healthy wood, as we would do to our pear and
quince trees when blight appears among them. I do not believe that
properly treated hazel bushes will ever suffer much from blight, at
least not in our vicinity. Neither do I believe that any more pruning
than I have outlined is required or necessary to our hazel plants.
The next subject about which I wish to say a few words is the
propagation of hazel plants. There seems to be quite a difference of
opinion as to the mode of propagating them; some advocate grafting,
others layering, again others from suckers only. Grafting I believe
myself, will produce a finer plant and the operation of doing so seems
quite successful, but a great many varieties produce so many suckers
that the graft is liable to be choked or crowded out if not constantly
watched, and it should not be expected of the average person to know the
difference between the graft and the wild shoot, and consequently, in a
comparative short time, he would have a wild or common hazel. For that
reason grafted plants should not be used for the trade until our people
get better acquainted with hazel plants. I, therefore, should recommend
layering, thereby having the plants on their own roots, which would
prove more satisfactory everywhere. That grafted plants bear fruit
sooner than layers, does not always hold good; it may be so with some
varieties, but not with all of them. I have some three year old grafted
plants and no fruit as yet, where I had plenty of layers in the nursery
rows two years old well fruited.
It is true that plants grafted on seedlings of the _Corylus avellana_
will not produce as many suckers, as plants grafted on layers of the
avellana type, but they will produce enough to confuse the average
person, as the foliage of some varieties are so nearly alike, that it
actually requires an expert to tell the difference. I, therefore, under
the existing circumstances, should advise the propagating of hazel
plants by layers only, until our people get better acquainted with the
hazel proposition in general. Why propagation by suckers only should be
preferred by some people, I fail to see, as they are practically the
same as layers, plants on their own roots from a parent plant, only that
layers are produced a little more scientifically and suckers more
naturally; otherwise they are identically the same thing.
When I referred to propagating, I should perhaps have mentioned the
growing of hazel plants from seeds, that is from the nut, but I did not
think it necessary. I will, however, say that plants raised from seed
should never be planted for fruit bearing unless they are grafted or
budded, as it has been fully and positively proven that plants raised
from seed, even if the very finest nuts of our European hybrids are
planted, will not produce nuts as good as those planted, but will almost
invariably go back to the original type, the _Corylus avellana_. It is
alright to raise plants from seeds for the sake of getting stock to
graft or bud on, but, as to variety, the seedlings are unreliable.
Before coming to a close, I would like to say a few words about the
fertilizing of the ground for hazel orchards and what experience I have
had in this matter, as I believe this would be of interest to all. It is
a well-known fact that hazel plants grow well and will thrive in almost
any kind of soil, as long as it is not too wet or too heavy, but from
time to time a little manure worked in is very beneficial both to old
and young plants, but care and judgment should be exercised, so as not
to overdo it. I have growing in one of my city lots with very fertile
soil, several bearing hazel plants, 7 to 8 years old, different
varieties. These plants grow so immensely that it plainly shows, they
are growing at the expense of the fruit, not only that the quantity of
nuts gathered from a plant there is considerably less than of same sized
plants grown on ordinary farmland, but the quality also is very much
below. My best nuts are all grown on ordinary farmland and the greatest
quantity has always been obtained from the farm where only very little
fertilizing or manuring had been done. For the growing of young plants
for commercial purposes, for the trade, I should recommend liberal
manuring at all times. (Applause.)
QUESTION: Is the hazel a long lived tree?
MR. VOLLERTSEN: I have known trees for almost forty years that
are bearing good fruit year after year, although not always a good crop.
They don't seem to grow so rapidly at that age as when younger.
DR. MORRIS: Hazels seem to graft pretty well on each other. I
think the tree hazel is going to be our most successful stock for
grafting. However, I have grafted on the _Corylus avellana_. The tree
hazel does not put out any suckers.
QUESTION: Does the hazel find its way into the market
commercially?
MR. VOLLERTSEN: I would almost think so. I have had lots of
inquiries for them from storekeepers. It seems to me there are a great
many imported around here. Our American hazels are not so very good.
There may be here and there a fairly good one, but I have not found any
really good ones worth propagating. I think if we would do more
scientific work we could get very good nuts. There is no question that
they are perfectly hardy and will stand almost any climate.
MR. JONES: Some of your varieties are hybrids aren't they?
MR. VOLLERTSEN: They are all hybrids. I have a few of the real,
original _avellana_ type I think got there by accident.
PRESIDENT REED: I believe the next paper is one the secretary
has from Mr. A. H. Graves.
DISEASE RESISTANCE IN THE AMERICAN CHESTNUT[1]
ARTHUR H. GRAVES
(Read by the Secretary)
Your secretary, Mr. Bixby, has asked me to tell you about the native
chestnut trees in the vicinity of New York City which I have found to be
resistant to the destructive bark disease. I commenced the search for
such trees in the summer of 1918, at the suggestion of Dr. Haven
Metcalf, of the laboratory of Forest Pathology, Bureau of Plant
Industry. During the campaign in Pennsylvania against the bark disease,
scouts had been on the lookout for immune or resistant trees, but
without result. As far as I am aware, no systematic organized search had
been made for such individuals.
It was our plan to commence the search in the region of New York City,
because this area is probably the oldest center of infection in the
United States. Apparently this is the port of entry where the
undesirable immigrants (Japanese or Chinese chestnuts) passed through
quarantine and were allowed to disembark carrying their terrible scourge
with them unnoticed. According to Metcalf and Collins,[2] this was
probably as early as 1893. This was why we selected this area to begin
on, for here the disease has had a longer opportunity to run its course
than anywhere else, and, consequently, has had ample time (more than a
quarter of a century) to call out the non-resistant trees. Those
remaining, if any could be found, might be suspected, _a priori_, of
being resistant.
As the work progressed, I soon realized that it would be most difficult,
or perhaps impossible, to locate resistant or immune trees in a region
not so long exposed to infection; for, in such a region, one would have
to inoculate all individuals suspected of possessing resistant
qualities, in order to ascertain whether their healthy condition was
actually due to resistant qualities or simply the result of a chance
escape of infection. We therefore decided to restrict the work, for the
present at least, entirely to a definite area about New York City. This
area includes all of the territory within a radius of about 16 miles
from New York City Hall, and therefore comprised in a general way,
Greater New York and the adjacent parts of New Jersey.
RESULTS OF THE SURVEY
First I made a thorough canvas of Staten Island, doing the work on foot,
aided by the trolley and the Staten Island R. R., and often guided by
that genial naturalist and lover of Staten Island, Dr. Arthur Hollick of
the Staten Island Institute of Arts and Sciences, I made a careful
survey of the whole 64 square miles of which the island is composed.
After two weeks of this kind of work, I began to get fairly well
discouraged, not so much because of lack of results which, it is true,
were entirely negative, but more on account of the appearance of the
dead chestnuts. For where it was not entirely cut out, the bare,
weathered poles showed that they had been dead for many years. The only
encouraging feature was the finding of large quantities of healthy
seedlings, from 7 years of age upward, to which I will refer later.
The Palisade region along the Hudson has been notable in the past for
its chestnut forests. I next attacked this, making as thorough a search
as possible from Hoboken to a little north of Alpine, N. J., which is a
small place on the Hudson opposite Yonkers. Here also the vast forests
of dead poles weathered gray with time, bore silent witness to the
completeness of the destruction.
About the middle of July while ferrying across the Hudson, I noticed
north of the landing at Dyckman St., what appeared to be chestnut trees
in bloom. On investigation, I found these to be living native chestnuts,
of the peculiar strip type I shall describe later, and proceeding
further north from this, where the Harlem enters the Hudson. I was led
into a forest where I found at least 40 living chestnuts, some of which
were in good condition, and one particularly was leafy nearly to the
top. (Fig. 1) Naturally, one would immediately suspect that somehow
these trees had escaped infection, but this could not possibly be the
case, for mixed in with them on all sides were bare, weathered trunks
showing signs of old worn cankers, proving incontestibly that the fungus
had been present here also for a long period. Shortly afterward, Dr.
Olive, of the Brooklyn Botanic Garden, informed me that he had seen
living chestnuts near Hollis, L. I., and at Valley Stream, L. I., and at
each of these places I found a group similar to that near the Harlem.
These, in brief, are the high spots of the survey from the point of view
of the scientist. In addition, I covered adjacent region of New Jersey
to the west, including the Watchung Mt. range about Plainfield and the
Oranges; the Bronx and Van Cortland Park and the country to Yonkers and
the north, and to the northeast of New Rochelle. Long Island, as far as
Hempstead, was also included. Altogether I travelled about 1200 miles on
foot, not counting the distance traversed on trolleys and railroads.
Always armed with opera glasses, I was careful not to use them when
anyone was looking, for on the second day of the survey I had been
arrested on the charge of being a German spy! I was also arrested on
board a train in New Jersey for looking earnestly at a topographic map,
then sharply out of the car window and noting what I had seen (dead
chestnut trees) on said map. The carrying of a botanist's tin can
(containing fungi, not bombs) was also an additional implicating
circumstance on the latter occasion.
What then were the results of the survey? They may be stated briefly as
follows:
1. No immune trees were found.
2. For the most part the older trees (from 20 years upward) were
entirely dead, and had been so for a long period, as attested by the
bare trunks, weathered a characteristic gray color which only time can
produce.
3. However, large numbers of seedlings and young saplings were located,
both healthy and diseased.
4. _The most important result was the finding of three well defined
colonies of living mature trees; all of which, by virtue of characters
to be presently described, are offering more or less resistance to the
disease._
SEEDLING TREES
It is well known that seedlings and young saplings are naturally immune
for a certain period, which varies in extent from 8 to 15 years beyond
germination of the seed beginning, of course with the first formation of
the seedling. Such immunity depends, however, not on any inherent
characteristic, but on the fact that at this period the bark is usually
smooth, sound, and free from wounds of any sort where Endothia spores
and mycelium might enter. Of course, when wounded from any cause
whatever during this period of youth, this immunity ends, so that the
condition might perhaps be termed physical, in contrast to physiological
immunity.
As I have already said, large numbers of seedlings, for the most part
still unattacked, were found in many places in the area surveyed. There
are of course no grounds for believing that such seedlings, descended as
they are from non-resistant trees, are physiologically immune. Where
they are free from disease, this exemption is due merely to the physical
immunity I have just mentioned. Since they therefore represent
non-resistant stock, they were used for comparative inoculation work,
which will be referred to later.
I may as well say here as anywhere, that by resistance, I do not mean
total resistance, for that would be immunity. There are, of course,
degrees of resistance, in the plant world just as in the animal world.
One person may resist a cold germ or the influenza bacillus better than
another, that is, it will cause him only a little discomfort. Another
person may not be affected at all, that is, he is totally resistant or
immune. I say this because I have misunderstood when I have used the
term resistance. The trees in the New York region show all grades of
resistance, from individuals where the fungus makes very little headway
in the bark, to cases where it grows almost as fast as in the average
non-resistant tree.
CHARACTERISTICS OF THE RESISTANT TREES
What now are the characteristics of these resistant trees? How are we
going to know one when we see it? I have outlined the leading features
as follows:
1. BARK. In the case of this particular disease, it is obvious
that the character of the bark is the most important feature since this
fungus is primarily parasitic in the living cortex. In other words, the
character of resistance must necessarily depend on the living cells of
the cortex. Now, careful observation of the resistant trees reveals a
most striking feature of the bark, namely its tendency to heal, by means
of a callus growth around the margins of the lesions, whether large or
small; and it is very apparent that this callus growth wards off the
advance of the fungus for a time at least. When the callus growth is
once formed, the fungus of the original canker encroaches on it very
slowly, or often not at all. Inoculations in the callused margins of
cankers showed usually only slight growth of the fungus after two
months' time in the summer, or in some cases no growth at all. Several
layers of wood could be counted underneath these callused margins--often
6 or 7--before reaching the annual ring exposed at the surface of the
canker. This of course, shows unquestionably that the callus had
remained healthy at that location for that period of time.
2. EXTENSION OF THE CALLUS TISSUE.--In many cases the callus
tissue is of considerably greater extent than the normal area one would
expect around a wound. It may even occur that the whole inner bark
around the trunk is of a callused nature, without any open cankers
showing at all. For example in a tree of which I have a photograph here
(Figs. 2 and 4), the outer bark is sloughing off, revealing callused
bark underneath of entirely different appearance, which no one would
recognize as chestnut bark. This particular tree photographed represents
an extreme in this respect. It seemed as if the whole tree was getting a
new kind of bark, and yet this same character appears in all of the
highly resistant trees. On cutting into this new callused inner bark it
was found plentifully dotted with tiny _Endothia_ lesions, which
however, never penetrated deeply. (Fig 4). Close to the cambium the
white inner bark is quite healthy, generally for a thickness of 5-7 mm.
That the mycelium in the small lesions was unquestionably the _Endothia_
mycelium, was shown by the appearance of the mycelium, and the presence
of the _Endothia_ pustules in many of the spots. That these were not
late infections, but only slowly growing small lesions, was shown by
inoculations in such bark, which revealed scarcely any growth after two
months.
[Illustration: FIG. 1
One of the most resistant trees, the smaller tree near the center of the
photograph, near the Harlem River, Boro of Manhattan, New York City.]
[Illustration: FIG. 2
A very strikingly resistant tree at Valley Stream, Long Island, showing
peculiar inner bark. The outer bark is sloughing off.]
[Illustration: FIG. 3
One of the "strip" trees in the forest in the Boro of Manhattan, New
York City.]
[Illustration: FIG. 4
Showing the character of the inner bark of the Valley Stream tree (Fig.
2). At one place, near the center of the photograph, the bark has been
shaved showing the small lesions caused by the fungus.]
3. THE WHITE SECRETION.--The most striking peculiarity of the
callus tissue, is its abundant content of a thickish, milky, white
substance. This came to light immediately when I cut into the callus,
and it showed up very clearly when I shaved off the outer layers of dead
cork tissue. The white material is not evenly distributed through the
irregular grain of the wound tissue, but is particularly abundant in
small spots or pockets which are especially conspicuous in the callused
margin of the lesion. Soon after exposure to the air the cut bark, and
particularly the white substance, redden rapidly, indicating oxidation.
This peculiarity is of course true of all chestnut bark, yet here the
reddening seems to be deeper and more rapid than the normal. No chemical
analysis has yet been made of this substance, but there is
sufficient other evidence at hand to warrant a tentative statement
that it is very rich in tannin or tannin compounds, and that possibly
the quality of resistance is bound up with the nature of this material.
4. THE STRIP CONDITION.--Some of the trees showed the living
bark restricted to a narrow, flattened, rope-like strip running up the
trunk to one or a very few branches (Plate 1, Fig. 3). In these cases
all of the bark was of the callus nature, rich in the resistant
substance, and plentifully besprinkled with small Endothia lesions,
while underneath were a number of layers of functioning wood. The rest
of the trunk was bare, weathered gray, with traces on its surface of old
cankers, and evidently dead for a long period. This type of tree was so
commonly found that I have called it the strip tree.
INOCULATIONS
The very fact that these trees are now alive in this New York region is
pretty good proof of their resistance. But of course the most conclusive
test is by inoculation with the fungus in question. If the fungus grows
slowly in these trees as compared with its growth on non-resistant
stock, then no one can deny that they are resistant. I will not bore you
with figures of tables, I will only give you the results. The average
growth of the fungus in 289 inoculations on the resistant trees was
about 1/3 as fast as on non-resistant stock, and taking the rate of
growth on those trees which are especially resistant it is about 1/4 as
fast as on the non-resistant stock. For non-resistant stock the
seedlings on Staten Island were inoculated, and the growth on these
tallied very closely with growth in non-resistant trees inoculated by
Anderson and Rankin.[3]
Another very striking result brought out by the inoculation work was
that of the 158 inoculations on branches and basal shoots of the
resistant trees, only nine had been girdled after one month's growth,
while in the same time 16 out of the 32 non-resistant Staten Island
trees were girdled. At the end of the second month, the results were
still more striking. Then, in the Staten Island trees, 22 out of 32 were
girdled, while in the inoculations on the basal shoots and branches of
resistant stock only 22 out of the 153 resulted in girdling. This
striking difference was not due to smaller diameters of the Staten
Island trees, for particular pains were taken to have them approximately
equal to the branches and shoots inoculated in the resistant trees.
SUMMARY OF EVIDENCES OF RESISTANCE
We may summarize the evidences of resistance as follows:
1. The results of the inoculation tests show that the fungus grows in
these trees on the average from 1/4 to 1/3 as fast as in ordinary
chestnut.
2. The occurrence of the trees in a neighborhood long subjected to the
disease, and their presence among the trees of individuals long since
dead.
3. Indications of the long period the disease has been present in the
trees themselves; such as bare weathered tops, and healed cankers.
4. Peculiarities of the bark; such as extensive development of the
callus tissue, and the presence of a peculiar substance or white
secretion which is particularly conspicuous in cases of marked
resistance.
IS THE DISEASE RESISTANCE HERE AN HEREDITARY CHARACTER?
As to whether this disease resistance is an inherent character and will
be transmitted from generation to generation, or is only the result of
particularly favorable environmental conditions such as soil, light or
moisture, is a point of great practical importance. I believe that
further work will prove that the resistance is heritable, for the
following reasons:
1. The resistance is not due to a particularly favorable environment of
the trees, for the three groups grow in very different soils and under
varying conditions of light and moisture.
2. The finding of the trees in colonies points to a genetic variation.
At first I was unable to account for the grouping of the trees, for I
had expected to find immune or resistant trees singly, here and there.
But if we adopt the hypothesis of a heritable protoplasmic
variation--something in their "blood," so to speak, the explanation is
easy. We know that chestnut fruits or nuts do not travel far, like the
seeds of willow, poplar, maple or ash, and therefore, in any given stand
of chestnut, if we could go back from generation to generation into
earlier time, most probably the majority of the trees would be found to
have arisen from a common ancestor, although of course a few outsiders
would have found their way into the group, carried by squirrels or other
animals.
3. In a considerable number of cases all the members of the same group
of coppice trunks from an old stump show a similar degree of resistance.
To attribute such a condition as due merely to chance, occurring as
often as it does, would be placing a pretty large burden on chance; and
since the coppice trunks are all off-shoots of the same plant, the
condition is what one would expect were the resistant quality in
inherent character. A correspondence of degree of resistance was also
noted, in the inoculations made on branches, trunk, and basal shoots of
the same individual tree.
Experimental work is being carried on at Washington to test out the
truth of this hypothesis, i. e. to see whether or not the disease
resistance is really heritable. The work is being carried on in
connection with the propagation of other resistant stock, Chinese,
Japanese, etc.; and, as soon as the department is sure of the product,
the results will be distributed to nut growers and others who are
interested.
In the meantime we can all help by being on the lookout for resistant
native trees. I believe they will be found in many places besides the
New York region.
FOOTNOTES:
[1] Illustration for this paper will be found opposite page 64.
[2] Metcalf, Haven & Collins, J. Franklin. The Control of the Chestnut
Bark Disease. Farmer's Bulletin--467, 1911, P. 5.
[3] Anderson, P. J. & Rankin, W. H., Endothia canker of chestnut.
Cornell Univ. Agri. Expt. Sta. Bulletin 347, 1914.
EVENING SESSION
SANITARIUM GYMNASIUM, at 8:00 P.M.
President Reed in Chair
DR. J. H. KELLOGG: Ladies and Gentlemen: Battle Creek has the
honor today and tomorrow to entertain the Northern Nut Growers'
Association. This association with other associations having similar
purposes, is undertaking to do, it seems to me, one of the most
important things that can be done for the American people--to show us
how we can get our nitrogen, our protein, and our fats without the
livestock industry which is wasting at least nine-tenths of the grain,
or in fact at least nineteen-twentieths of all our foodstuffs. The great
cause of the high cost of living at the present time is that the pigs
and the cattle are eating up our corn and other good things that we
ought to eat ourselves. If we had a sufficient area of land, perhaps
even the sides of our roadways and railways planted out to black walnuts
and other good nut trees, we would have all the protein and fat we
needed, perhaps as much as we are getting now, and more, and the cattle
industry might be entirely dismissed from consideration, and a great
deal of labor would be saved. I am sure that there is no place in the
whole United States where this Association could have a heartier welcome
than here in Battle Creek, or where people could be found who would
appreciate its labors any more. You are going to have a very interesting
program tonight. We are favored with visits from very distinguished
gentlemen from all over the United States, among others Dr. Robert T.
Morris, the nestor of American surgeons has come all the way from New
York to tell us about some wonderful discoveries he has made, and a
fatherless walnut tree he is cultivating, and other things that will be
of great interest to us all I am sure. I take pleasure in introducing to
you the president of this Association, Mr. W. C. Reed, of Vincennes,
Indiana. Mr. Reed.
PRESIDENT REED: We are simply continuing our program. This
afternoon we were in session at the Annex and moved over here this
evening so as to be able to present what we have here so we could
entertain more of you than we could over there to advantage. You know
that most all men have a hobby along some line or other, and those who
constitute our leaders, whom we have to look to, and along the line of
nut trees of different species and so on, we have learned to look to Dr.
Morris as one of the leaders. I have great pleasure in introducing to
you Dr. Robert T. Morris, of New York, who will address you on the
hickory.
NOTES ON THE HICKORIES
ROBERT T. MORRIS, M. D., NEW YORK CITY, N. Y.
When people speak of the "hickory" without qualification, they are apt
to have in mind some one kind of hickory which belonged to their boyhood
environment. All other kinds which they happened to know, were qualified
in some way, very much as the word "fish" in Boston stands for the
codfish only, other kinds of fish in the world being described by
qualifying names. In the northeast the hickory means the shagbark. In
Missouri it means the shellbark. Elsewhere the pignut and the mockernut
are called "hickory." Interest in the subject has increased so rapidly
of late years that we must all of us be more particular in our
descriptions and add qualifying names, speaking always of the shagbark
hickory, pecan hickory, or bitternut hickory as the case may be. Sargent
describes fifteen species of hickory and in addition a large number of
varieties by environment and by hybridization. There is a Mexican
hickory, making sixteen species for the North American continent, and
the late Mr. F. N. Meyer, Agricultural Explorer from Washington, has
found a hickory in China. Previous to this discovery, it was believed
that the hickories belonged to the North American continent only.
Botanists divide the hickories into two groups, Apocarya and Eucarya.
For convenience in every day conversation, it might be well for us to
speak of the "open-bud" group and the "closed bud" group. _Apocarya_ or
the "open bud" group, includes the pecan hickory, _Carya pecan_, the
bitternut hickory, _Carya cordiformis_, the bitter pecan, _Carya
texana_, the water hickory, _Carya aquatica_, the nutmeg hickory, _Carya
myristicaeformis_, and the Chinese hickory, _Carya cathayensis_. The
winter buds of this group will be seen on examination to show the
minute, snugly curled-up leaves which are ready to burst forth when the
springtime sun opens the fronds of the ferns which have forced their way
through the hard ground with clenched fists. The scale buds in the
open-bud group do not cover the tiny leaf forms completely.
In _Eucarya_, or the "closed-bud" group, stout scales close the bud
completely against the snow and ice of wintry days, so that we see
scales only when looking at the bud. The closed-bud hickories include
the shagbark, _Carya ovata_, the Carolina hickory, _Carya
Carolinae-septentrionalis_, the shellbark, _Carya laciniosa_, the
mockernut, _Carya alba_, the smooth-bark hickory, _Carya leiodermis_,
the pallid hickory, _Carya pallida_, the close-bark pignut, _Carya
glabra_, the loose-bark pignut, _Carya ovalis_, the Florida hickory,
_Carya Floridana_, the Buckley hickory, _Carya Buckleyi_, and the
Mexican hickory, _Carya Mexicana_.
Hickories which have nuts with a bitter pellicle, all belong to the
open-bud group. These are the bitternut, Texas hickory, and water
hickory. Hickories with scaly bark are found in both groups. In the
open-bud group, the trunk of the water hickory carries long loose bark
strips attached by one end, and in the closed-bud group, we find this
characteristic belonging to the shagbark, shellbark, Carolina hickory,
and to one of the pignuts, Carya ovalis. That takes us to another
occasion for a note. What do we mean by "pignut?" In the North, this
term is applied to Carya glabra and Carya ovalis. In the South, it is
applied to Carya cordiformis. A name so well established, will have to
be retained, but in our Association it will perhaps be best to have an
understanding about which one of the hickories the common name pignut
should belong. So long as it already covers two species in the North as
opposed to one in the South, there are already two votes to one in favor
of retaining the name pignut for Carya glabra and Carya ovalis. We may
describe these in plain language as the smooth-bark pignut and the
loose-bark pignut. The reason for choosing the name "loose" instead of
"scaly" is because we are pretty well agreed upon applying the name
"scalybark" to the Carolina hickory, the name "shagbark" to Carya ovata,
and the name shellbark to Carya laciniosa. The name bitternut may
safely be allowed to remain with Carya cordiformis because the other two
nuts with bitter pellicle already have distinctive names, Carya aquatica
being called water hickory and Carya texana being called bitter pecan.
By making fixed points in nomenclature in this way we may head off the
confusion which will become worse confounded as the interest in
hickories becomes rapidly enlarged, if our committee on nomenclature
does not take some decisive step.
Concerning Latin nomenclature, we have further troubles for settlement.
Hicoria is the oldest generic name and naturally should have priority
but the Vienna Congress of Botanists adopted Carya. So far so good (or
bad). Now comes our trouble in giving specific and varietal names. The
binomial is clearly applicable enough for species, Carya pecan, for
example, but when we come to varieties of the pecan there are two kinds
of varieties to be considered, those by environment and those by
hybridization. In cases of natural variation we are still within
accepted resources in nomenclature by saying for example, Carya pecan,
var, Stuartii. When naming hybrid varieties, however, I would suggest
that in advance of the abbreviation "var", we place the abbreviation
"hyb." thus reading for Brown's pecan, "Carya pecan, hyb. var. Brownii,"
instead of "Carya Brownii," which latter binomial would throw it among
the species. In view of the fact that we are to have in the future
hundreds of named hybrids, it seems to me that we must adopt some such
definite method for convenience promptly. This method of naming, relates
to convenience and is applied to the most evident parent. As a matter of
fact, in horticultural circles we are doing precisely that sort of
thing, speaking, for example, of "Brown's pecan" meaning a nut which we
recognize as being a hybrid, brought to attention by Brown but with the
pecan as parent most strongly in evidence.
When I was a boy, the only hickory nuts of any sort available, were
those collected from wild trees. The popular boy was one who knew of
some trees which furnished the best nuts and who did not keep the news
to himself. The squirrels knew the best nuts as well as the boys did and
they would go past many hickory trees along fences and groves in order
to congregate in the ones which had the nuts with the thinnest shells
and plumpest meats of best quality. In the early morning hours I have
seen several squirrels in one particularly good hickory nut tree and not
a single squirrel in a tree completely filled with nuts, though its
branches touches those of the first one. Men are quite as intelligent
as squirrels in some respects. Here and there attempts were made at
propagating fine hickory trees of various species by planting nuts. It
was not generally known at that time that the hickories were so
thoroughly crossed like the apples, that they would not reproduce true
to type from seed. Attempts were then made at grafting which were mostly
failures for many years. We are now on the verge of a great development
in hybridization or crossing of choice kinds of hickories and in
determining upon which stocks the different kinds of selected hickories
may be grown to best advantage. Hybrids between varieties of hickories
occur frequently in nature and hybrids between species of hickories
occur occasionally. A number of these accidental hybrids have been
discovered and some of them are now being propagated. For the most part
they do not represent the best quality of the best parent but it is a
notable fact that the bitterness of kinds with the bitter pellicle
appears to be a recessive character and disappears usually from hybrids
between species in which one parent has a bitter nut. Unfortunately, the
finer extractive which give character to the nut of the better parent
are prone to disappear also. This is in line with our experience in
mixing of characters along Mendelian lines. Given a sufficient number of
hybrids and we shall have here and there one with spectacular
characteristics of special value.
Now that horticulturists at the present moment are turning so freely
toward the idea of producing quantities of hybrids artificially, the
next generation will see hickory nuts which were not dreamed of in the
days when I was a boy. The crossing of hickories is not difficult work.
We simply remove the male flowers from branches carrying female flowers
before the male flowers have begun to shed their pollen. The female
flowers are then covered with oiled paper bags tied over them for
protection and when the danger from self pollination has passed, we take
off the bags and add a little pollen which we have kept for the
purpose--pollen from some trees bearing remarkably valuable nuts.
Nuts resulting from this cross pollination when planted, give us new
varieties of trees which never have been seen before by anybody and that
is so interesting that very many people will probably take up
hybridization as an incident in recreation. Some of the hybrids will
bear very early in their history and others very late. If one is
impatient to determine at once which ones are to be valuable, he can
hurry the process by grafting a number of cuttings from young seedling
trees into the tops of larger trees which are already bearing--labeling
each graft, so that he may keep track of the seedling stock from which
it came. It is possible to put one hundred or more seedlings in the top
of some stock tree at one time.
One reason for delay in propagation by grafting is because the hickories
like many other trees are slow in making repair of wounds. Grafts
usually perished before being accepted by the stock under grafting
methods that were in common use. The best step forward in grafting
method for hickories is one that I obtained from Mr. J. F. Jones,
Lancaster, Pennsylvania. He tells me that he obtained the method from
its originator, Mr. E. A. Riehl, Godfrey, Illinois. This consisted in
covering the entire graft, buds and all, with melted grafting wax and
including also all of the wound and wrapping of the stock. The buds make
their way through this grafting wax without any difficulty, but the
grafting wax used by Mr. Jones contained lamp black and that used by Mr.
Riehl consisted of a beeswax and rosin mixture. It was found that these
seemed to be applicable in the North but not farther south in the hotter
sun. Examining into the reasons for this, it seemed to me that in all
probability the black grafting wax used by Mr. Jones and the brown or
amber grafting wax used by Mr. Riehl, would naturally allow the heat
rays of the sun to pass through to the graft while halting the actinic
ray of light. The latter is extremely valuable for promoting the
activity of chlorophyl, which acts only in the presence of light and in
the best way in the best light. The heat rays might have certain
destructive qualities. With this theoretical idea of the situation in
mind, I employed melted paraffin in place of the grafting wax, covering
the scions completely as well as the wound in the stock and the
wrappings. This immediately proved to be a success. In fact, it appears
to have changed the entire subject of grafting nut trees in such a way
that any intelligent boy employing this method can now do better hickory
nut grafting than would have been possible at the hands of an expert two
years ago. The melted paraffin fills the interstices in which sap might
collect and ferment, but at the same time, hardening so quickly that it
does not introduce the danger of extension between points of contact
with scion and stock. The second point of value consists in allowing the
actinic ray in the sunlight to act upon the chlorophyl in bud and bark
of the scion and it does not attract the destructive heat ray. This is
perhaps the most important single point of value and due to the
transparency of the paraffin. Third, the paraffin coating, impervious to
air, maintains the sap tension equally in the course of fluctuation
between negative and positive pressures occurring between night and
day, and under varying conditions of light and temperature. This
maintenance of equalised sap tension, I believe to be important. The
paraffin is waterproof and prevents evaporation from the scion, which
otherwise is prone to dry out before granulation of the wound has taken
place in the hickories, as in other species which callus slowly. Fifth,
under the paraffin coating of stock and scion, the plant apparently does
not have that anxiety which would otherwise lead it to introduce the
protective feature of superization, the spreading of a corky layer over
the wound surface between stock and scion, thus introducing a mechanical
obstacle to union.
This method of grafting has extended the grafting season for nearly two
months, apparently. Formerly, I hurried to get all of the grafts in
while buds were bursting, in early May. During the season of 1919 I
grafted hickories up to August sixth experimentally. The last grafts
which caught well in a practical way were put in on July twenty-first.
After that the proportion of catches was small and the growth feeble.
Incidentally, it may be remarked that filberts grafted as late as August
sixth, did perfectly well. The scions employed were cut in late winter
and kept in the sawdust of my icehouse. I formerly supposed that ice
beneath the sawdust was important, but this year I could not get ice and
the scions kept just as well. In July, experiments were tried with
grafting directly from one tree to another, using wood of the season's
growth. This worked well with hazels, but not with hickories or walnuts,
only one out of many hickory grafts catching. That one, however, is
significant and I hope to work out principles which will allow of direct
grafting of hickories as readily as may be done with the hazels.
When a hickory graft is to be inserted into a small stock or branch, the
ordinary cleft graft does well. In stock recipients much larger than the
graft a side cleft of the width of the scion only is desirable, or
better yet the "split bark" method devised by Mr. E. A. Riehl. A
straight split is made in the bark of the end of the stock, and the
graft crowded down into this split so that it remains between bark and
wood finally. My own method for large stocks, is what I have called "the
slot bark method." This consists in turning down a width of stock bark
measuring the same as the scion in width. When the scion has been
inserted into this slot so made, the bark is turned up over it again and
fastened there. By this method I have put scions in the trunks of trees
nearly a foot in diameter and at any chosen point, sometimes several
feet below the ends of cut branches. One may cut off the top of a large
hickory tree and then peg the trunk full of scions by means of bark
slots.
Another important point in hickory propagation work consists in the
employment of the Spanish windlass for fastening graft and stock
together. The old time wrapping of twine or of raffia had to be released
in order to allow growth at the point of union of scion and stock. When
cord is used it cuts deeply into the new growth, and raffia, which is
placed on flat, will be burst open. In either case new wrapping is
required at a precarious time, according to old methods. The Spanish
windlass, which is used in surgery for controlling haemorrage, seemed to
me to be applicable for fastening scions in place. It consists in a
paraffined cord with ends tied in a firm knot but hanging loosely about
the graft and wound. A wooden skewer or any small lever, is then
inserted into the loose loop of cord and twisted about until the part of
the cord about the graft wound is so snug that it holds the scion in
place more firmly than it can be held by any other sort of wrapping. In
order to prevent the cord from cutting into the bark, two shields of
wood or metal an inch in length, are interposed between cord and bark.
The lever of the Spanish windlass is fastened with a cord or with a
galvanized nail in order to prevent the windlass from unwinding and the
whole covered with melted paraffin. This may remain in place for two
seasons without change, holding the scion firmly in place all of that
time and requiring no attention. The growing stock separates the two
shields very much as it might separate two stones in the field and
automatically unwinds the Spanish windlass by sheer force, just enough
to allow growth without any unloosening of its holding apparatus.
In hickory grafting, much experimental work remains to be done in the
choice of stocks for grafts of different species. Almost all of the
hickories that have been grafted upon the pecan hickory stock, seem to
do pretty well upon that stock, but the converse is not true. The pecan
apparently does not do well as a rule when grafted upon other hickory
stocks, even upon those of its cousins in the open-bud group. The
shagbark hickory, in my experience, has done best upon stocks of the
shagbark or mockernut or pignut. A number of years, however, are
required in some cases for determining that point. Shagbarks which I
have grafted upon bitternuts have sometimes made a remarkably good
start. Then at the end of three or four years they begin to slow up,
while shagbarks on shagbark stock, starting slowly at first, surpassed
the ones on bitternut stock finally.
In the spring of 1919, I topworked two trees standing near together and
of about the same size (thirty feet) with Beaver hybrid (a cross between
the bitternut and the shagbark). One of the trees was a bitternut and
the other a pignut. Almost everyone of the grafts of the Beaver grew
thriftily on the bitternut. Those on the pignut stock practically all
caught and made short growth and then began to wilt back. Finally, only
one shoot remained alive. This very striking object lesson will have
bearing in varying degrees in all of our hickory grafting. According to
my experience to date, hybrid hickories are grafted more readily than
are straight species or varieties. They seem to have lost family pride
and seem to take up with any friend offering economic support. In the
case just quoted, however, caprice was shown by the Beaver hybrid which
took eagerly to a host of the species of one of its parents. It refused
to thrive on the pignut which did not represent either one of its
parents although that same pignut stock would have been accepted by
shagbark scions--the shagbark representing the other parent of the
Beaver. This sort of experience throws open the entire subject in such a
large way as to show what possibilities of success and failure lie
before us in experimental work. The same method of grafting, the
paraffin windlass method, was employed for these two trees which were
neighbors.
Interesting experimental work is to be done in finding the extent to
which different species and varieties of hickories may be grown out of
their indigenous range. At Stamford, the bitter pecan from Texas,
appears to be perfectly hardy but it makes very slow growth--sometimes
less than an inch in a year. The Buckley hickory also from Texas, grows
thriftly at Stamford and so does the Carolina hickory Pecans from the
northern belt thrive at Merribrooke, but those from the southern belt
have such a long growing season, that their new wood is not yet
sufficiently well lignified to stand the winter well. Some of them pull
through a mild winter in fairly good order, but on the whole they do not
thrive.
The commercial side of hickory raising, is being worked out for the
pecan only at the present time. We may assume that several of the other
species of hickory adapted to growing in the north, will equal pecans in
importance, eventually. The reason for that is because some of the other
hickories stand quite as high as the pecan in food value and general
excellence. At the time of writing, low grade seedling shellbark nuts
from the West are selling in the retail market in New York for forty
cents a pound. I have seen better nuts of this species being loaded on
the cars in Ohio at fifty cents a bushel. The present New York price, to
be sure, represents a profiteering war price. Fine grades of shagbark
hickories and some of the hybrids will command prices equally high with
prices for best pecans in the market of to-morrow.
VOICE: Will it be practical to plant nuts, get young plants,
and then bud or graft them?
DR. MORRIS: Yes, that is what we do. It is practical to plant
nuts for the purpose of getting a stock, but not for the purpose of
getting nuts. But we plant them in the nursery rows, and then when they
are two years old, preferably (some like three-year-old trees), we graft
them over to good kinds in the nursery row; then they remain there for a
year or two, and are transferred or sold. We now have members of this
association who are experts in grafting nut trees who make that a
business. It is not generally known that we have in this country three
journals devoted wholly to the subject of nut culture. We have
nurserymen who make a specialty of grafted nut trees of the very best
sorts, so that one may perhaps take up this mode of farming more
profitably today than almost any other sort of farming. One gentleman in
Pennsylvania told me he made thirty thousand dollars on one crop of
chestnuts two years ago, cultivated chestnuts. He had thirty acres, and
no tree was yet fourteen years of age. His net profit beyond all
expenses was thirty thousand dollars that year. There are probably very
few professional men who make more than that a year. Many men are making
good, comfortable incomes out of their nut orchards. It is the best
insurance against the needs of old age, the best sort of life insurance.
VOICE: Do you use anything besides the hickory as stock for
grafting on?
DR. MORRIS: Yes, we have some experimenting to do in order to
learn which stock will best serve for a certain variety. We find that
one species or variety of hickory will accept other varieties of that
species well, but perhaps it will not accept another species. We do know
that certain kinds do remarkably well on certain stocks; but the entire
range of that subject has not as yet been worked out.
QUESTION: Does the stock you graft on have any effect on the
quality of the fruit?
DR. MORRIS: The stock on which you graft is supposed to have no
effect at all on the quality of the fruit. But there are some
exceptions. We learned that in orange grafting. A naval orange grafted
on the wild orange stock might be raggy, not full of juice; while when
grafted on the trifoliate orange stock might be heavy and full of juice.
So in that case the stock did have some influence upon the graft; and
there are other instances. But as a rule we assume that the stock has no
influence upon the graft in regard to the validity of character.
QUESTION: Are pecans a variety of hickory?
DR. MORRIS: Yes, pecans are hickories. The Indians gave it the
name of pekan. The French spelled it pecanne, so that has been spelled
as the pecan, without the necessary other part of its name, hickory. We
should always say pecan hickory--always.
DR. KELLOGG: Dr. Morris, how old hickories may be used for
grafting?
DR. MORRIS: I have experimented with trees up to fifty years of
age; but the most satisfactory work, perhaps, is done with trees that
are not more than fifteen or twenty years of age and three or four or
five inches in diameter. Those are the best trees to work with. If we
cut off the limbs of a very old tree and try to top work it, it means an
enormous amount of work on the part of the orchardist, more work than my
employees like to give it. But one may topwork a tree of almost any age,
preferably a tree less than twenty-five years of age; and by choice I
should say trees not more than ten years of age. We have experts in the
audience better qualified to speak on that subject than I am.
QUESTION: Do you prefer the melted paraffin to the
old-fashioned way of using bees wax?
DR. MORRIS: The old-fashioned beeswax had a certain color, and
the black wax with charcoal, with lampblack, both turned the light ray
and allowed the heat ray to enter so that the amber of the old resin
wax, and the black of the black wax both allowed damage to occur to the
tree, in the South particularly, in a hot climate early in the summer,
prevented our grafting in the summer because of the turning away of the
light ray that was wanted and the absorption of the heat ray that was
not wanted. The melted paraffin being perfectly transparent, allows the
light ray to set the chlorophyl into activity. All the life processes of
the tree are carried on under the influence of the green chlorophyl
grains, and these work only in the presence of light.
QUESTION: Can you successfully graft a pecan on the pignut?
QUESTION: What is the best stock to graft pecan on?
DR.MORRIS: Pecan stock, I think. I do not think we have
anything better. Mr. Reed and Mr. Jones are both experts in that field.
They have grafted hundreds of thousands of trees.
PRESIDENT REED: I think the pecan is the best. The hickory will
grow on the pecan very well, the shagbark hickory, but it will not do to
change it with any degree of success.
DR. MORRIS: The shagbarks will grow fairly well on pecans, but
the pecan not well on the shagbark. It is best I think to put shagbarks
on shagbark or shellbark. But they do well on pignut. I have got some
very good shagbarks on mockernut. On bitternut they grow fast, but at
the end of eight or ten years are inclined to slow up. Shagbark can be
put on, I suppose, ten other kinds of hickory, but the pecan can not.
QUESTION: How many grafts would be necessary on a nut tree
twelve inches in diameter?
DR. MORRIS: I should say you would probably have to put in
fifty. I would cut off the branches down to about two inches or an inch
and a half in diameter, and that might leave fifty stubs to graft. Graft
all of them, is one way to do it. Having done one that way, you will
then become familiar with the entire subject.
QUESTION: What is the best time of year?
DR. MORRIS: I don't know. Some time ago the American
Agriculturist said to its readers that there is disagreement about the
best time for pruning peach trees. Let us hear from all our readers. So
all of the readers wrote expressing their opinions, and the editor
said, "Summing up all of the opinions, the entire testimony in the case,
we have decided that the time to prune your peach tree is when your
knife is sharp." I had always supposed that the best time for grafting
was when the buds were first bursting in the spring, always held rigidly
to that, and at that time of the year was in a great hurry. I dropped
professional work and lost hundreds and even thousands of dollars in
order to see this work go ahead; it is more interesting than
professional work. And now this year, with this new method, I have
grafted right straight on up to the first of August, and everything
growing--deliberately, all through the summer. So that now, at the
present moment I do not know. A year ago I could have told you. When I
first graduated in medicine, I could answer any question in medicine.
After forty years of surgery, I am puzzled over a great many questions.
It is the same way regarding grafting.
QUESTION: In summer grafting do you remove the leaves from
scions?
DR. MORRIS: In summer grafting I have used for the most part
scions I have kept in the icebox in sawdust. I have formerly put in
twenty or thirty tons in my icehouse for my family to use during the
summer. Last winter we could not get any ice, and my scions were just as
good kept in the sawdust as if we had had ice; and I grafted those
scions in August and the grafts are living. I have also cut off the
leaves in grafting, but that is new and you can not depend on it,--stop
at one tree, cut off a piece of it, and put it on another tree and have
it grow. I have never done that until this year, and it does not succeed
in a very large percentage. It is not practical. It can be done--I have
proven that; but it is not practical. The best way is to use your scions
from last year that have been kept in cold storage in sawdust or leaves.
DR. KELLOGG: When should the scions be cut?
DR. MORRIS: There is some disagreement about that. Almost all
scions may suffer a little winter injury. Some men prefer to cut in the
early part of December before we have had any hard winter, then keep
them in cold storage during the entire year, moderately moist, or
protected in sand, leaves, or stratification. But I have always
preferred February myself, cutting them the last of February before the
buds begin to start, then put them in sawdust in the icehouse or cold
storage, or bury them under a thick layer of leaves. For budding you
transfer immediately. In fact, budding technically comes under the same
physiologic principles as grafting. In budding I do that work in my
place at Stamford, Conn., about the latter part of July or early August.
DR. KELLOGG: Do you use the same method in transferring buds?
DR. MORRIS: Yes, I fix them the same way as I do the graft and
cover everything with paraffin. I have even had a little short side
graft grow using this paraffin method, a graft two or three inches long.
DR. KELLOGG: Tell us about those fatherless walnuts.
DR. MORRIS: In the course of crossing the nut trees, we
supposed, as a matter of course, that we must always have the pollen
from one tree, or from a tree which bore the staminate or fertilizing
flowers, in order to develop nuts or fruit of any sort; but on one
occasion I covered a lot of Chinkapin female flowers with paper bags; I
didn't have pollen enough to go around and left the bags on because I
happened to be too lazy or too busy to pull them off. About a month
later when I did take them off I found a full set of chinkapin nuts
under those bags. They had received no pollen. That was an observation
of a good deal of interest. It may have been that they had gone on by
what we call parthenogenesis, and we had the children without the
father, had the female parent only, the fatherless chinkapin. It sounds
sad. I followed up the experiment with other nut trees, and found that
not infrequently we may develop fatherless nuts. The effect will be,
according to natural law, to intensify the characteristics of one
parent. The female which bears this fruit, this child, without a father,
will give to that child an intensification of her own characteristics.
That will be the effect of parthenogenesis. That may be continued
through several generations perhaps; we do not know. It is new, quite
new. (Applause).
PRESIDENT REED: The next topic is the Digestibility of Nuts, by
Mr. Cajorie, of Yale University.
THE NUTRITIVE VALUE OF NUTS
F. A. CAJORIE, YALE UNIVERSITY, NEW HAVEN, CONN.
Mr. President and members of the Northern Nut Growers' Association: It
was with great pleasure that I accepted the invitation of your
Association to be present at this convention and give a discussion of
nuts and nut production, from the point of view of their nutritive or
food value. During the last few years our knowledge of nutrition and the
parts that individual foods may play in the diet has been greatly
increased and in the light of the new discoveries, it is interesting and
valuable to view the place that nuts hold.
As you are well aware, nuts have been used as foods by the peoples of
the world. In many places nut products have made up a very appreciable
part of the diet. Chestnut flour is extensively used in Southern Europe.
Among the peasants of Tuscany, chestnut flour forms a considerable part
of the total diet. In this region, also ground acorns are made into
bread with cereal flours and in this form is a common food. The hazel or
filbert nut is also seen in the form of flour on the shores of the Black
Sea. Races living in the tropics have utilized the many varieties of
nuts indigenous to tropical climes such as the coconut, Brazil nuts,
Java almond, Paradise nut, candle nut and African cream nut. In the
Orient, the lichi, ginko and water chestnut, and in Italy and India the
varieties of the pine nut are used to considerable extent.
In America, with the exception of a few localities and among a limited
class of people, nuts have never made up a staple part of our dietaries,
rather they have been used as tasty supplements to otherwise complete
menus. That they are prized as adjuncts and are sought after is
strikingly shown when we see in our markets not only the products of our
native American nut trees, the hickory, walnut, butternut, chestnut,
pecan, beechnut and pinion, but the Brazil nut, filbert, English walnut,
peanut, coconut, all of which are derived from foreign countries or from
trees originally imported to America from other lands.
Analysis of nuts have shown them to be of two types, one rich in fats
and protein, the nitrogen containing component of our foods and the
other relatively rich in carbohydrates, or starches. With the exception
of the chestnut, and the coconut, most of our more common nuts belong to
this first class, and chemists have pointed out that in these nuts we
have a concentration of protein and fat seen in no other class of
foodstuffs. For example, the protein-fat rich nuts have a percentage of
protein varying between 15 and 30% and a fat content of 50-70%; compare
this with other foods that we think of as being concentrated; eggs, 12%
protein and 10% fat; cheese 28% protein, 37% fat; round steak, 20%
protein, 14% fat; and bread, 10% protein. This nutritive concentration
in nuts places them in a unique position among our natural food
products. Our cereals, meats, fruit and vegetables all contain more or
less water or refuse that reduces their concentration, while in nuts we
find a compact form of almost pure food.
We are dependent on foods for the source of energy that is necessary to
perform our work and maintain our body temperature much in the same way
that a steam engine is dependent on the fuel supplied it to perform the
mechanical tasks assigned to it, and this fuel value of foods in turn,
depends on the amount of protein, carbohydrate and fat, particularly the
latter, that are present in the foods. At once we see, in our
concentrated nuts, a tremendous source of energy, provided that we can
digest these nuts and make this energy available.
Despite the fact, as revealed by chemical analysis, that in nuts we have
a source of protein and fat in a concentration rarely seen in foods,
there have been relatively few experiments to actually determine the
digestibility. Prof Jaffa at the California Experiment Station was the
first to make a comprehensive investigation along these lines. He made
extensive digestion tests on men using most of the more common American
nuts. His results, as reported in a bulletin of the U. S. Department of
Agriculture, indicated that nuts when they made up a substantial portion
of the diet, were well digested by those who ate them and gave no
intestinal disturbance or discomfort.
Nuts have had a reputation for indigestibility that was wide spread, not
only among people in general, but also among physicians and dieticians,
and even Prof Jaffa's clear cut experiments failed to dispell this idea
of indigestibility that had been empirically assigned to nuts. A few
years ago, a rather extensive series of digestion experiments were
inaugurated at Yale University in an effort to settle this question of
the indigestibility of nuts and also to test out some of the commercial
nut products to find what effect roasting, boiling, and other processes
that nuts are subjected to, had to do with the digestibility. Through
the courtesy of Dr Kellogg of Battle Creek, it was possible to follow up
these experiments with a series here at Battle Creek. It is the result
of these tests that I wish to speak of today. One word regarding the
method which is the conventional one for such experiments. The amount of
food eaten by the individual or animal is weighed at each meal and the
composition determined by chemical analysis. The intestinal output is
collected, weighed and analysed. From the difference in any substance
such as protein in the food and the protein which appears in the body
refuse, the amount digested and absorbed or utilized by the body is
easily determined. For example; if 10gms. of nitrogen were eaten in the
food and one gm appears in the feces, we say that the coefficient of
digestibility of that nitrogen is 90%, that is 9 of the 10 gms. eaten
were absorbed by the body. The average of a great many such tests on
mixed diets has the following standard coefficient: protein 93%, fat
95%, and carbohydrates 98%.
Our digestion experiments show the following results: for protein
digestion of nuts, almond 89%, peanut 84%, pine nut 89%, Eng. walnut,
83%, Brazil 88%, and coconut 88%. In all cases the carbohydrate
coefficients are 98 or 99%, and in the case of the carbohydrate rich
chestnut, normal digestion took place after the nut was heated so as to
rupture the starch granules. In all of these cases the nut made up a
substantial part of each meal and was eaten in large amounts. The
experimental subject, experienced no digestive troubles or discomforture
whatsoever except in the case of the English walnut, which evidently
contains some irritating substance that causes diarrhea. Except for the
pecan which gave rather low utilization, the protein of nuts was
digested to a high degree that compares most favorably with our ordinary
foodstuffs.
How then explain the undoubted discomforture that many people experience
after eating nuts? I believe that the explanation rests on the fact that
our common American way of eating nuts, is not the rational way. We
would not consider topping off a heavy meal with eggs, meats or cereals
or to eat these in large quantities between meals realizing that we are
exposing ourselves to possible digestive discomfort. No more then, can
we expect to so eat nuts which are even more concentrated or "heavy"
than meat or eggs without occasional discomfort. Unpleasant results from
so eating does not condemn the nuts as indigestible, rather it condemns
our mode of using that nut. Further, we must recognize that the nut is a
hard, compact substance and that unless completely masticated, is not
readily penetrated by the digestive juices of the alimentary canal. This
was very well brought out in our experiment with dogs. The dog bolts his
food and where there were large fragments of the nut in the food, they
appeared almost unchanged in the feces, while if the nut is ground fine
before feeding, it was readily digested. Comparisons of nut butters and
nut pastes with the whole nut also brought out this point. The
completely commuted nut butters showed consistently higher degrees of
digestion than the whole nut.
With the exception of the starch rich chestnut, the heating of the nut
did not seem to effect the digestibility whether this heat was boiling,
steaming or roasting. The raw nut apparently is as well digested as the
heated products. No differences were found between nut butters whether
the process involved steaming or roasting of the nut. I am not speaking
of the enhancing of the flavor that heating may bring about, but only of
the digestibility.
Dr. Longworthy and his co-workers in the Dept. of Agriculture have
investigated in recent years the digestibility of many vegetable oils,
among them nut oils, and have found as high a percent of utilization
with these as with butter and our other common animal food fats.
I believe that we are fully justified in the conclusion that nuts and
nut products, if rationally used in our diets, are as digestible and
fully as valuable from a nutritional point of view as our other
foodstuffs.
While we can now definitely speak of the high digestibility of nuts, it
is necessary to consider other phases of the part played by foods in
nutrition. The fact that a food after being taken into the body can be
broken up by the digestive juices of the alimentary tract, and the
products absorbed, as we have found, to be the case with the nuts, is
not the end of the story of the function of that food.
About fifteen years ago, it was discovered that during the progress of
digestion, the protein materials are reduced by the digestive juices of
our stomachs and intestines to smaller chemical compounds, and that it
is these smaller fragments of the protein molecule that are absorbed
into the blood and are used to build up our muscles and tissues. These
fragments or "building stones" as they have been fancifully called, are
all of a distant class of chemical compounds known to chemists as amino
acids. Eighteen of these acids have been found as the products of
protein digestion.
We may conceive of our bodies as being continually supplied with a mass
of these 18 building stones from which it selects the kind and number
that it needs to repair the everyday wear and tear of the tissues and in
the case of the growing child builds new structures.
Since the date of this important discovery regarding the fate of
indigested protein, it has been found that with few exceptions, the body
is not able to manufacture these amino acids or to change one kind into
another, and must depend on the protein eaten, for a supply of the
various kinds that go to make up the body protein. Further it has been
found, that many of our commonly used food proteins do not contain all
18 of these amino acids components. In some foods one, two, and
sometimes more are lacking, or if present are in very small amounts. If
our diet contained only proteins of an inferior grade, we can picture
our body requiring building stones of various kinds to maintain the
structure of the body and unable to obtain them due to the poor quality
of the food, protein. Nutritional failure would be the result. The
proteins then must be of the right quality as well as present in the
proper quantities, to prevent mal-nutrition. Bearing in mind these
facts, it is necessary in studying a food such as our nuts, to determine
the kind of protein the individual nut contains as well as to know
whether or not it can be digested by the body.
During the past few years, it has been found that we must have in our
foods a certain amount of substances whose chemical nature is at present
unknown and to which the name of vitamines has been given. It is not my
purpose to discuss with you the many phases of vitamines and their
relation to nutrition, but I only wish to impress upon you the fact that
it is of the utmost importance for a dietary to contain these
substances; fully as important as that the protein, fat, carbohydrate,
and inorganic salt content shall be satisfactory. Lack of these
vitamines brings on various evidences of mal-nutrition. One vitamine
which is found in animal fats and the leaves of plants and is soluble
in, and associated with fats, is, for that reason, called fat soluble
vitamine. Another called the water soluble vitamine is widely
distributed in cereal seeds, vegetables, and legumes. The third, the
so-called antiscorbutic vitamine because of its action as preventative
and cure for scurvy, is found in certain fruits and vegetables.
We then ask the next question: Are nuts adequate as far as their
proteins contain these essential amino acids, and do nuts contain
vitamines? That is, is their biological value as satisfactory as their
digestibility?
Dr. Hoobler of Detroit, in a study of the diets of lactating mothers and
wet nurses, a year or so ago, compared the value of proteins from animal
and vegetable sources for the elaboration of milk. He found that a
mixture of the almond, English walnut, peanut and pecan, furnished
proteins that were equal to the animal food tried, and far superior to
other vegetable proteins. Here then is evidence that nuts provide the
necessary building stones to form milk that food par excellence for the
newly born individual. Drs. Mendel and Osborn, experimenting on white
rats have shown that the principle proteins of the Brazil nut will
maintain animals through the growing period. Bureau of Chemistry workers
and others have found similar results with the coconut and the peanut. I
have now, experiments underway at New Haven, on the biological value of
the filbert, English walnut, pine nut, almond, and pecan. While these
tests are yet incompleted, it can at least be said that to date there is
no evidence that the proteins of these nuts are in any way less
satisfactory than those of the peanut or Brazil nut that have been
thoroughly tested out.
As to the vitamine content, abundant quantities of water soluble
vitamine have been found in the peanut and the coconut. Experiments that
we have in progress as well as a series conducted here at Battle Creek
under Dr. Kellogg's direction give promise to increase this list of
vitamine containing nuts to include at least many of our common nuts.
Along with our vegetable oils in general, coconut oil and peanut oil
contain insufficient quantities of the fat soluble vitamine to maintain
growth in young animals. Whether the other nut oils will prove more
efficacious in this respect, is now under investigation. As far as I am
aware, the antiscorbutic properties of nuts have not been studied.
With the population of the world on a steady increase, it continually
becomes necessary for mankind to seek out new sources of food, and
utilize products that formerly had received little attention as possible
foods. Conditions that disturb normal food production and distribution,
such for example as were brought about by the world war, produce serious
food shortages in the world, and emphasize how close is the margin that
determines whether the peoples of the world have adequate quantities of
food or whether they are faced by shortages, and, in many cases, by
starvation. In this continual development of our food resources, nuts
stand out prominently as offering possibilities which are very great.
Not only do they represent a very concentrated form of food which is
highly digestible, but they possess a number of characteristic and
highly pleasing flavors that recommends them for use in all manner of
culinary procedures. The variety of uses to which nuts can be put in the
kitchen is amply demonstrated right here in Dr. Kellogg's sanitarium and
I feel sure that even he has not exhausted the possibilities of nuts in
the dietary. The forms of nut products on the market are steadily
increasing. The nut butters, nut pastes, nut margarines, meat
substitutes, and so forth, all point to the variety of ways that nuts
can be handled as foods.
The tremendous increase in the use of nut oils in the form of the oil
itself and as nut margarines within the last few years is a striking
example of the utilization on a large scale of relatively new food
products. The press cake which remains as a by-product of this oil
industry finds ready use as concentrates for cattle feeds. Many of our
ideas in the feeding of our domestic animals are undergoing development
along with the idea of human nutrition. Just recently, investigators at
the Wisconsin Experiment Station, reported that the well known "home
grown ration" for dairy cows that consist of cereals, silage and hay, is
not a large milk producing diet. Their recommendation is to supplement
this ration with protein concentrates. Nut meals recommend themselves
most highly as protein concentrates. It certainly is safe to say that
the day when the fruits of our nut bearing trees will be allowed to fall
ungathered from the trees, is at an end.
There are many problems that still call for an answer by the chemist and
dietitian. The nutritive value of the individual nuts should be firmly
established in all its phases. The causes that have made the use of
certain nuts unprofitable commercially, should be studied with the view
of correcting these stumbling blocks. For example, the freeing of the
horse-chestnut from its poisonous saponins and enable us to use this
starch rich nut as food is well within the range of possibility as
indicated by experiments conducted in Austria during the war. Why do nut
oils tend to become rancid easily and can this tendency be remedied? Is
the freeing of the acorn and its tannin and other objectionable
substances a practical consideration? What is the irritating principle
of the English walnut?
All these problems and many others wait solution. Research on nuts is in
progress in many places. It involves time consuming experiments that are
often times expensive. As a result, progress is slow, the amount of
research being limited by the financial factor. The value of the pecan
nut crop alone of the year 1918, was over 91 million dollars and the
value of the imports and exports of nuts and nut products during the
same year amounted to over 51 million dollars. If one one-hundredth of
one per cent of this sum should be devoted by those interested in the
development of our nut industry in this country for the study of the
nutritional and chemical properties of nuts, I feel sure that they would
be amply repaid for their investment.
PRESIDENT REED: I believe this will complete our program for
tonight. We have quite a full program for tomorrow morning. Mr. C. A.
Reed, nut culturist of the U. S. Department of Agriculture, is with us
and was to have been on the program tonight, but he has been busy all
day and was hardly ready for tonight's program, as he has been busy
getting the exhibit in order, and he will be on the program tomorrow
morning, and three or four others, among them Dr Kellogg, I believe, so
that there will be quite a full morning's program, and we will be glad
to have all of you come who can. We meet in the parlor of the Annex at
ten o'clock tomorrow morning. If any one desires to join the Association
and will speak to the secretary, he will give yow the necessary
information.
END OF TUESDAY EVENING SESSION
* * * * *
WEDNESDAY, DECEMBER 10, 1919, 10:00 A.M.
PRESIDENT W. C. REED IN THE CHAIR
PRESIDENT REED: Mr. O. C. Simonds of Chicago will talk to you
on "Nut Trees in Landscape work."
NUT TREES AND BUSHES IN LANDSCAPE WORK
O. C. SIMONDS, CHICAGO, ILLINOIS
In considering material for landscape work the places that come to mind
where such work would be required are home grounds, highways, parks,
cemeteries, school grounds, city squares and woods. The highways would
include city streets, parkways, usually called boulevards, and country
roads.
All trees are beautiful and should serve in some place in landscape
work. Some_are more beautiful than others and where but few trees can be
used the more beautiful would naturally be chosen.
BLACK WALNUTS
Not long ago, a lawyer was talking to me about the beauty of black
walnuts. To his mind there is no tree more beautiful and from what he
said, he would use it almost to the exclusion of other trees. My own
judgment does not fully coincide with his although I consider a black
walnut a very attractive tree. It grows to a large size and is generally
healthy. Its shape is good and the foliage attractive in summer. The
leaves drop early and they are not especially attractive in autumn
coloring. Black walnuts are strong in appearance. They lack the
gracefulness of the elm and if I were making a list of trees in the
order of their appearance, placing the most beautiful first and the
least attractive last, I should place several trees ahead of the black
walnut, among them sugar maples, elms and several of the oaks. Perhaps
the black walnut would come about in the center of the list for most
locations. The list itself would vary for different situations and
climates. I should advise using black walnuts plentifully along the
highways, especially country roads, and somewhat sparingly in home
grounds and the other locations which I have named. By plentifully, I
do not mean to the exclusion of other trees, for, in some places, there
should be more elms and maples than black walnuts, but highways are so
extensive that many kinds of trees could be used in abundance to give
shade. In woods there are places where black walnuts could be used in
profusion.
The objections that one might raise to the use of black walnuts would
be, first, the comparatively short season of the leaves. These come out
rather late in the spring and drop early, probably these trees can not
be improved very much in this respect. Second, boys will sometimes throw
sticks at the trees to bring down the nuts. If a boy comes in home
grounds to do this, he will be considered a nuisance. Branches are
sometimes broken and the trees disfigured from this cause. Along
highways this objection might perhaps be lessened somewhat by planting
enough trees so that there would be more nuts than the boy would want,
or by improving the manner of the boy. Third, the trees are often
attacked by caterpillars. This objection can usually be obviated by
spraying or destroying the pests in other ways.
BUTTERNUTS
The remarks made about the black walnut would apply in many ways to the
butternut, its nearest relative. Butternuts have a range extending
further north and they are more subject to disease than the black
walnuts. Like the walnut, their leaves come out late and drop early.
They are subject to the attacks of boys. When healthy, they are
attractive in appearance and they deserve to be planted in most places
where trees are used for landscape effect, but in the list I suggested,
they would come below the black walnut.
HICKORIES
There is a time of the year when the shagbark, which produces such sweet
nuts, would be more attractive than any neighboring tree. It is when the
big buds swell and send out yellowish green leaves surrounded by large,
red bracts. At this time they are as showy and as beautiful as any
flowers. The bracts soon fall, but the leaves turn a rich green and are
attractive until early fall, when they are sometimes yellow, and
sometimes drop without any marked coloring. The trunk of the hickory is
unique in appearance as the bark separates from the tree in long
platelike strips which hang on at one end and give the scraggly
appearance from which the tree derives its name. All of the hickories
are attractive in appearance, but some of them drop their leaves early.
The hickories are difficult to transplant but this is nothing against
the beauty of the tree. An established tree is more valuable on this
account. In some places hickories are quite subject to disease or to the
attacks of borers. Like the walnuts, hickories which produce edible nuts
are subject to the attacks of boys, but, on account of the toughness of
the wood and the roughness of the bark, they are usually quite able to
withstand these attacks. Hickories are suitable for use in all landscape
work so far as their appearance is concerned. The fact that they are not
so used is due to the difficulty of transplanting them. In the fall when
a maple tree has colored up beautifully and a hickory near it has
dropped its leaves, we are apt to compare the two unfavorably to the
latter, but we should remember the appearance in summer and especially
when the leaves first unfold. Hickory trees are beautiful also when the
leaves are off, their branches making beautiful etchings against the sky
in winter. The pecan, which is the largest of all hickories, is an
exception to the general rule because it is planted quite extensively,
especially in the South. It is a beautiful tree and where it is hardy
there is no reason why it should not be used as a street tree, a tree in
home grounds, in parks, or any other place where deciduous trees are
needed. It is raised extensively in some nurseries, while the other
hickories are raised very sparingly, and some not at all.
THE BEECH
Some would consider the beech the most beautiful of all nut trees. Its
comparatively smooth, bluish-gray bark makes it a distinctive tree at
all seasons. Its branches, spreading straight out from the trunk, give
it an appearance of strength. Its fine branches form a specially
pleasing skyline, its sharp buds are trim and neat in appearance, its
leaves are beautiful in shape and texture. Their fall coloring, while
not as brilliant as that of the maples, is really beautiful, being
either yellow or a rich brown. The leaves are apt to hang on all winter,
especially on the younger growth, and then they often turn a straw
color. If a list of beautiful trees for February were to be made, I am
rather inclined to think that the beech would stand at the head of the
list. A young beech with its bluish-gray bark, its straw colored leaves,
and flecks of snow here and there, seems to me the most beautiful of all
deciduous trees in winter. The young leaves also are especially
attractive when they first appear and the blossoms are sometimes objects
of interest, although not showy in color.
HAZELNUTS
Often in old pastures one finds forlorn, scraggly looking bushes and is
told they are hazelnut bushes. One would not pick out bushes like these
to plant in his front yard, and yet, when given a chance, there is
scarcely a more attractive shrub than the hazel. It is one of the first
shrubs to blossom, the staminate flowers hanging in slender, graceful
yellowish-brown catkins, while the pistillate flowers are little points
of purplish-red protruding from the buds. These blossoms appear long
before the leaves. The latter, when fully developed, are beautiful in
outline and soft in texture and they have a rich coloring in the fall
including various shades of yellow and red. The hazel should certainly
be used extensively in landscape work. The nuts, with their leaflike
involucres, are attractive in appearance in August and September. In
connection with our own hazel one would naturally think of the filbert,
which is a European relative. The filbert is often planted for ornament.
There is a variety with purple leaves which some people admire.
THE OAKS
Of all our native trees, I think the oak excels in beauty of foliage. By
many oaks might not be considered nut trees, but nearly all of the
acorns are eaten by squirrels or other wild animals and so I think it
would be proper to mention oaks when speaking of nut trees in the
landscape. In the northern states we have two groups known as the white
oak group and the red oak group. The trees of the former have soft, dull
green leaves with rounded lobes, while those of the latter have shiny
leaves with lobes ending in points of filaments. The former mature their
acorns in one year, while the latter require two years to bring them to
maturity. The acorns of the white group are sweet, while those of the
red group are more or less bitter. The foliage of all oaks is attractive
when it first appears, the small leaves varying in color from almost
white through pink, yellow, and red to the deepest purple. Perhaps the
red oak excels all other trees in the beauty of its summer foliage and
its leaves are also richly colored in autumn. The Bur Oak, in addition
to having attractive foliage, has a rough, dark bark that gives it an
attractive appearance in winter. The white oak, especially when young,
holds many of its leaves in spring and these with their brown color,
give a warmth to the snowy landscape. One could make a most beautiful
park by planting nothing but oaks and they should rank with maples and
elms as street trees.
CHESTNUTS
There is a tree which a few years ago would have been considered along
with the oak in landscape work, but which now would not be thought of in
certain regions on account of a disease which has practically destroyed
it. This tree is the American chestnut. It grows to a large size, and if
it were not for this disease, would be worthy of a place in any park.
Hundreds of thousands of dollars have been spent without success in
endeavoring to exterminate the disease. Some of the introduced varieties
are apparently exempt from this disease, but only the future can tell
whether the chestnut will again become valuable in landscape work as
well as in the raising of food and lumber.
In designing landscapes, we think first of open spaces and then bound
these spaces with trees and shrubs having pleasing shapes and foliage.
The tops of these trees form the skyline and the lower growth a margin
of lawns, or perhaps of walks and drives. For these purposes the
beeches, hickories, hazels, walnuts and butternuts are all valuable,
their value being approximately in the order named.
HORSE CHESTNUTS AND BUCKEYES
There may be some question about including these in a list of nut trees.
I understand, however, that the seeds of all of these trees have been
used for feeding stock and perhaps some way may be found for making them
available as food for men and women. There is no question about their
usefulness for ornamental trees. In Europe, the horse chestnut has been
used extensively for park and boulevard planting and it is also largely
used in the United States. There are several varieties. The leaves
appear early, the blossoms coming out later. Our own buckeyes are
handsome in appearance and all are adapted for use in landscape work.
The arguments for and against the use of nut trees in landscape work
would be somewhat similar to such arguments regarding fruit trees. A
luscious fruit tree like the snow apple, would be omitted from the list
of trees for the park, not because it lacks beauty, but because its
fruit would lead to its destruction. Apple trees might, however, be very
appropriate for private grounds. They have sometimes given a name to a
home, as "The Orchard". The same is true of certain nut trees, "Walnut
Hill," and "Hickory Grove" being not uncommon. The hazel, too, is
frequently used in naming home grounds, streets or localities. A name
would not be used in this way unless the object bearing it was held in
esteem. I am glad there is an association to encourage the raising of
nut trees and I hope to see such trees used in this way extensively, for
the purpose of developing attractive scenery as well as for food
production.
MR SIMONDS: When Mr. Bixby asked me to prepare a paper and come
here and read it, I wrote back I would prepare a paper and send to him
to read; and afterwards Mr. Reed came to see me, and knowing that he
would be here, I concluded I would come. I dictated a paper and
afterwards I found I had left out a few nut trees, and I want to speak
just a word regarding those before I read my paper. One of those is the
coconut palm. I was thinking more particularly of trees in this locality
when I dictated the paper; but the coconut tree aside from raising the
coconuts, I think is the most magnificent palm that we have. There are
other trees that some like better, but I think the coconut palm is the
most picturesque, the finest tree to plant. I prefer it to the other
large palms. It has great spreading leaves, sometimes fifteen or twenty
feet long, a feathery top, and the trunk is not quite straight, and I
like it a little better because it is not. Then here is the English
walnut. I did not speak in my paper about the English walnut, but there
is a tree that is a beautiful tree, and where it is hardy it should of
course be planted for ornament as well as for the nuts. And then there
is the almond which we do not have here as a nut tree, but which they
have in California, which has some attractions, and might be planted,
although it is really not so ornamental as some of the nut trees; still
it is worth planting. (Applause).
PRESIDENT REED: Are there any questions you would like to ask
Mr. Simonds while he is with us, or is there any discussion?
DR. MORRIS: There are two or three points for discussion. Mr.
Simonds does not think highly of the almond. I do for decorative
purposes. When I drive in my driveway at Stamford and face that
magnificent blaze of blazing clouds of almonds in the springtime, I
think it is something worth while; it is the hard shelled almond. It
will grow as far north as the peach does. The only trouble is they are a
little more subject to leaf blight and need a little more attention. But
where the peach will grow you can raise the almond profitably. Among the
hazel nuts the most beautiful of the entire series is the tree hazel
that grows about as large as the smaller oaks, and that is said to bear
twenty-five or thirty bushels of hazelnuts a year,--enormous crops. That
is perfectly hardy here, and the beauty of the tree is such that I
believe it to be a very important addition. I would like to hear Mr.
Jones' opinion on that point. I use it for grafting purposes for other
hazels. The Japanese walnuts, almost tropical in their rapid growth,
sometimes grow six feet in a year in rich ground, and with their great
sprays of leaves sometimes a yard in length, and the seedballs of the
heart nut variety give really a tropical appearance to the grounds where
the ground is rich enough. They will grow almost any place, but in rich
ground they are certainly very wonderful. Among the chestnuts, of
course, we have a number of hybrids now that resist blight very well;
and the little chinkapins for lawn bushes are very attractive. One of
our most beautiful chestnuts is splendid for a lawn specimen and is
evergreen in the South. When I was a boy I never had plums enough; so
one of my ambitions was to have plums enough so I could see some of them
rot on the ground. We can do the same thing with nut trees--have nuts
enough so the boys will be full and have nuts enough. It seems to me it
ought to be one of our ambitions to have so many nut trees along the
roadsides in the parks, etc., that the boys and the squirrels can not
use them all up.
MR. SIMONDS: I think the Doctor is right in some of his
criticisms. In fact, the almond is something like a peach, and I had not
prized it for use in landscape work so very much on account of certain
diseases which would be apt to affect it here if it were not taken care
of as we would take care of trees in an orchard. The hazel tree, of
course, would be attractive if it is hardy here. I have had doubts about
its being hardy because of its coming from southern Europe.
DR. MORRIS: It is hardy in all Canada. They have fine tree
hazels in the park at Rochester. They have there probably the largest
tree hazels in the country.
MR. C. A. REED: I would like to have more questions asked. I
feel as though I had accomplished a real achievement in getting Mr.
Simonds here. I was under him a short time a number of years ago and
learned something of his skill as a landscape gardener and the
reputation that he has; and I felt that we could not hope to have a
better authority on these points that he has discussed than we could in
Mr. Simonds; and it is something that is constantly coming up. The
Department of Agriculture have to consider that people want to know what
trees they can plant in the landscape; and I feel particularly glad to
have Mr. Simonds here.
DR. MORRIS: It seems to me we ought to talk more about the
nut-bearing pines in the landscape, because where you are planting pine
trees, you might as well plant the nut-bearing kind as the others; they
are just as beautiful, and you combine the Greek idea of beauty and
utility.
MR. SIMONDS: Certainly, that is a tree I have omitted, because
in this region we have not had any nuts.
DR. MORRIS: There are four pines that will bear nuts here--the
Korean pine, the pignolia or stone pine, the Italian stone pine and the
Swiss both. There are five nut bearing pine trees that are all market
trees for nuts, that I know will grow and bear here, including the lace
bark pine.
MR. SIMONDS: Are they raising nuts in Michigan on pines?
DR. MORRIS: No, but they might. Those five kinds would grow
here and bear nuts here, so they have a double value.
MR. SIMONDS: I think we ought to raise them. Of course they are
beautiful in the landscape.
DR. MORRIS: The whole idea of your paper is to approach the
Greek ideal--add utility to beauty.
MR. SIMONDS: That is what nature does. It makes beautiful
leaves, then uses the leaves for plant food.
MR. C. A. REED: I wonder, Dr. Morris, if you can tell where
these pines can be had.
DR. MORRIS: The Korean pine is from northeast Asia, and you can
get those from the original pine seed; the lace bark pine is from
northeastern Asia where the climate is like ours. The Swiss stone pine
and the Italian stone pine are from Switzerland and Italy and closely
related--both excellent trees. The fruit now you buy as the pignolia in
the markets. Both those are sold as pignolia nuts. It is a commercial
nut of Europe. The white barked pine you would get from the West. It has
a beautiful fine large nut, and you would get that from any Pacific
coast dealers in nut trees.
MR. SIMMONDS: Has that another name?
DR. MORRIS: I do not know of any other name for it. Wait: The
single leaved pine is one. That grows so far north on the Pacific, but
we do not know whether it will ripen its nuts here or not. It is
perfectly hardy here and would be a beautiful nut tree, grows well. The
single-leaved pine--that is _monophylla_. There are four or five pinons
that will live, but they do not grow fast enough to make it worth while
to raise them in Michigan. The Jeffrey bull pine is another one that
will grow here and bear fruit, with a beautiful blue-green foliage. The
Jeffrey bull pine is one of the most beautiful and thrifty pines. That
is the Jeffrey variety of ponderosa. The nut is very much larger than
the nut of the ordinary ponderosa. The nut of the ponderosa is small,
but the Indians use them and eat them, shell and all. When we come to
using the pines more freely for food purposes, we are going to do what
they do in Europe with some of the small seeded pines--crush them and
make a mass, squeeze the cream out from the nuts, dry it a little, and
that makes very fine rich cream; then the residue is given to the
chickens and pigs. There are in all about thirty pine trees now that are
used for market purposes where they fruit, and we will undoubtedly
increase that number. I do not doubt that fifty species of pine trees
will be planted for their fruit by two generations from now when we feel
the need more.
PRESIDENT REED: We will be glad to have questions from any one.
I think we get more from the discussions than we do from the papers.
VOICE: In regard to the hickory nut, the shagbark, back in
northeastern Ohio, four years ago we had quite serious trouble with
our hickories there along in the month of June, about the time we get
the common June bug, there was a large bug that looked like the June bug
that seemed to work at night mostly. We did not see them active in the
day time, but they ate the foliage entirely off the lower branches and
those limbs from which they ate the foliage died. In some cases, the
tree died. I would like to know if anyone knows anything about those.
That was new to me. I have had opportunity to answer all sorts of
questions about that. I have been asked I guess by a thousand different
people about that insect, and I have not been able to learn anything
about it.
MR. SIMONDS: I can not tell you.
SAME VOICE: One man told me when he knew I was coming here,
"For goodness sakes find out something about that if you can."
DR. MORRIS: It probably is the June bug, and turkeys and ducks
would solve the problem.
MR. C. A. REED: The only suggestion I would make is that in
Ohio you have one of the best posted authorities on nut insects there is
in the country. That is Prof. H. A. Gossard, at Wooster. If he can not
tell you about it, no one can.
MR. J. F. JONES: I think it is no doubt it is the ordinary May
beetle that is doing the mischief.
PRESIDENT REED: I might say we had quite a deluge of beetles
along that line in the nursery a year ago this last June, the first time
we have ever been bothered with them. They finally became so thick we
had to go through and shake the trees and shake them off. They looked
something like the May beetle, only smaller, hard shelled, and seemed to
come by the millions; but they only lasted a few days, and it was all
over, and we have never seen them since.
MR. C. A. REED: There is one more question I would like to ask
Mr. Simonds, and that is in regard to the proper distance for spacing
nut trees along avenues and in parks.
MR. SIMONDS: I think that in both of those situations it is
well to give the trees a natural appearance by grouping, and sometimes
they can be far apart, and sometimes I think there might be a group of
two or three close together, so that they would grow in one group. That
will give a more natural arrangement in parks, and we have room enough
along the sides of most of our highways to have the same effect there.
The policy to be pursued with regard to spacing nut trees along highways
would be the same that we would follow in planting any other trees, and
one of the most attractive streets I know is now in the city of Grand
Rapids; it used to be in the country when I lived there years ago; but
along the sides of that street there are native trees, mostly burr oaks,
and they have grown just as nature planted them. There will be a group
of two or three, then a space, may be a single tree, then there may be a
group of five or six; and that natural arrangement is really beautiful,
to me far more beautiful than a straight row of trees, uniform spaced.
On that same street sixty or seventy years ago my uncle planted where
there were no trees--it is a continuation of this street--rows of sugar
maples, and they grew and finally made splendid trees, and a great storm
came along and broke down two or three, and that was a source of great
regret to my uncle; but his son thinks, perhaps, it was a good thing,
because it opened a beautiful view out into the country. Now by grouping
trees we can save beautiful views. If we plant uniformly, we get
monotony. With this belt of burr oaks spaced as I have described, you
have variety on your sky line. Some trees are a little farther up than
others and catch the sunlight, and we get shade and light. That is the
way I should plant nut trees. If I were planting black walnuts or
butternuts I would group them, but see that the tree has in some
directions space enough to develop as far as it wishes.
MR. C. A. REED: Mr. Simonds is about to go. That is the reason
I precipitated this question at this point. It was asked with reference
to the law which these gentlemen, sitting at my right here, were
responsible in putting through in the legislature of this
State--provision for planting food trees along the highways; and it may
be before Mr. Simonds goes, they have something further to ask.
PRESIDENT REED: These questions are very important to draw out
information. Is there anything else you wish to ask before we leave this
topic? If not, we will call on C. A. Reed to present his paper next. It
was carried over from last night, I believe.
NUT CULTURE IN MICHIGAN
C. A. REED, WASHINGTON, D. C.
There is evidence on all sides that the people of Michigan are deeply
interested in nut culture. Some have invested in pecan lands in the Far
South; no doubt some own Persian (English) walnut, almond or filbert
orchards on the Pacific Coast; and others are at the point of planting
nut trees in Michigan. Everybody would go nutting in fall if he could.
Michigan leads all other northern states in what its institutions and
some of its people have done toward developing the nut industry.
Some thirty years ago the Lake Shore and Michigan Southern Railroad
Company showed its interest in nut production, when it planted many
miles of chestnut trees along its tracks running north from Adrian.
Between 1888 and 1892 there were planted on the grounds of the
sub-experiment station at South Haven, a number of pecan trees of Iowa
and Missouri seed, Japanese walnuts, a number of filbert plants and a
collection of almond varieties. At about the same time, Prof L. H.
Bailey set out half dozen pecans and Japanese walnut trees on the campus
of the Michigan Agricultural College. Later, Professor L. R. Taft added
several seedling Persian (English) walnut trees to the group.
In traveling over the southern part of Michigan, one cannot go far
without seeing signs of interest in nut trees. Everywhere the black
walnut has been spared or planted. In certain sections it is to be found
about practically every farm house or at least near enough by to furnish
the winter supply of the family nuts. The chestnut is less common in any
part of the state than is the black walnut, not appearing to any
considerable extent except in the lower southeastern corner. It has not
fared well in the state either as a native or planted tree. The Persian
or so-called English walnut has attracted considerable attention from
time to time, and under especially favorable surroundings one
occasionally finds thrifty specimen trees. The pecan, the Japanese
walnut, European hazel or more popularly called the "filbert" have all
been given limited trials at various times. Even the almond has had a
day in Michigan. Quite possibly the pistache has been through the same
experience; but if so, the fact is not generally known. That species is
from arid Asia and wholly unlikely to succeed in the latitude of
Michigan although a young tree of a Chinese species ornamental because
of its fine feathery foliage, green in summer but which takes on a
brilliant hue in fall is, or was the last we know, doing well on the
private grounds of Dr. Robert T. Morris, near Stamford, Conn.
Among the kinds of nut trees from which we can select varieties for
planting in Michigan, there are eleven or more distinct species. With
such a range as this, one might ask, why not go into nut growing in
Michigan on the same scale as in the growing of apples and peaches.
There are probably better reasons why this is not being done, but two
very good ones are that there are not enough available trees of good
varieties to plant more than a single orchard of respectable size in the
state; and the other; it would not pay to put good Michigan land to nut
trees of such varieties as are now available even though they could be
had.
If nut trees can't be had and wouldn't pay if they could then why
publish an article on "Nuts for Michigan Planting," is probably what
will run through the minds of most readers of these lines. It is
certainly a logical question, but there are at least ten reasons why nut
trees should be planted in Michigan.
1. The forests of Michigan have reached the point of depletion such that
for the sake of future generations, trees of some kind other than fruit
must be planted.
2. While planting, we may as well select those capable of performing
more than a single service; in other words, trees of maximum possible
use. Oaks, poplars, ashes, pines, elms, etc., all have their places, but
not one in the group can produce anything of food value to humankind.
3. Nut trees of most kinds, rightly used, are valuable for timber
purposes and are very effective in the landscape.
4. Members of the walnut family including the hickories are especially
appropriate along the highways and city streets. They are sturdy,
long-lived and not easily damaged by storms or neighbor's boys.
5. Nuts are among the very best of the meat substitutes. They contain
much of the same food elements as do meats, although in different
proportions. Some contain starch and to that extent can be used as are
the cereals and Irish potatoes. Nuts are the only vegetable product
grown in Michigan, which in raw condition afford a complete and fairly
well balanced food for human beings. Every pound of nut food that can be
raised from a tree along the street or in the fence corner on the farm
is clear gain, and that much added to our national food supply.
6. Nuts are rapidly assuming importance as factors in the lists of
American foods.
7. Many species of nut trees are adapted to some parts of Michigan. By
planting the best that are now available, and by constantly being on the
lookout for better sorts, superior varieties will be certain to develop
in a short while, the same as has been the case with all older orchard
fruits and farm crops.
8. Whoever intelligently plants nut trees performs a distinct public
service. He will receive the gratitude of more than the present
generation.
9. Among all kinds of trees, none are more appropriate for memorial
purposes to the men who did not come back from France, than is the black
walnut. That species itself took a valiant part in warfare. It furnished
material for gunstocks the same as in previous wars, but in the World
War it rendered what was considered by eminent authority, a greater
service in supplying propellors for aeroplanes. The shells of the nuts
contributed their part toward the making of carbon for gas masks, and no
one knows the extent to which walnut kernels made up the delicacies sent
from home to the boys in the trenches. With such a service record as
this, the black walnut is entitled to a memorial of its own. Its value
as a timber tree, as an ornamental, and as a food producer, together
with its great range of adaptability from North to South and East to
West, should justly entitle it to recognition as a National tree.
10. Michigan has a law providing for the planting of nut trees along its
highways. Thus, the state has officially put its approval on the idea
and has become a leader in the encouragement of this great kind of
economy and thrift. It has taken a step toward conservation in a
direction which is highly developed in certain parts of Europe. The
product is sold to the highest bidder and the income used in the upkeep
of the road system. In that manner the roadways of those sections take
care of themselves. In this country millions of dollars of state and
federal moneys are being used this year, (ending June 30, 1921), in the
construction and upkeep of public roads.
Desirable as it would be to accomplish these ends, it could not all be
done at once. Even though there were an abundance of available trees of
tried kinds, it would take a long time to plant them and to care for
them until they might become of profitable bearing age, also public
opinion would need to be remolded in order to insure their care and
protection. Still it can and will be done. The movement is already on;
the Michigan law began to operate soon after being passed, and the
Division of Forestry at the Agricultural College is raising the trees
for planting. Public opinion regarding the care of the trees and their
product will take care of itself when the value of the trees and their
products becomes apparent. Both in California and in Oregon not only nut
but fruit orchards and vineyards, grow beside the roadways with no
protection other than that of public opinion; and what has been done in
one part of the country can be done in others as well.
The eleven species referred to as being available for Michigan use are
as follows: The almond, beechnut, butternut, chestnut, filbert, (hazel),
pecan, shagbark hickory, shellbark hickory, black walnut, Japanese
walnut, and the Persian or so-called English walnut.
Taking these up in order we will consider first the
ALMOND
Except as an ornamental, the almond does not offer a great deal for use
in Michigan. It is sometimes said to be as hardy as the peach, but only
as this refers to the tree and not to the fruit, is it true. Certain
hardshell almonds edible, yet so inferior to the improved varieties as
to have practically no market value, do sometimes succeed in lower
Michigan but their value is limited to their beauty when in bloom and to
the production of a low grade product. In form and general appearance
these almonds are much like peach pits. Very often they contain much of
the same bitter taste of Prussic acid common to the kernel of the
ordinary peach. They are interesting to observe while growing especially
as they begin to ripen. The covering outside the seed is thin and
leathery and while ripening, splits and peels outward in curious
fashion.
Perhaps the only recognized variety of almond of this class which is
known to have fruited in the East is the Ridenhower from southern
Illinois. Trees can be had from some of the nurserymen.
THE BEECH
One of Michigan's noblest, hardiest, and most often abused trees is the
American beech. It is common from north to south. No tree is more
handsome and none, unless possibly it be the white birch, is so often
defaced. Dr. Robt. T. Morris, of New York City, reminds us that
according to the scriptures, man, genus _Homo_, is a finished product
made by and in the image of the Creator. A safe assumption is that the
scriptural reference is not to the creature whose initials appear on the
trunk of a beech or whose knife has removed bark from white birch. His
genus is not _Homo_, and he is not scripturally recorded.
The beech is not directly important as a nut bearing tree, but
indirectly it is as the nuts are rarely harvested. Indirectly it is of
great value. No food is better for turkeys and hogs than are beechnuts.
A bushel of beechnuts that can be used in this way replace at least a
bushel of corn. The difference in cost of production should make
beechnuts worth several times as much as corn.
In Europe a valuable oil used as a drug and for salads is expressed from
beechnuts. Possibly individual trees could be found somewhere in
Michigan which produce nuts large enough, good enough, and in quantity
enough to justify their recognition and propagation as named varieties.
No matter whether distinct varieties appear or not, the beech is well
worthy of planting in many places about both the farm and the city lot.
BUTTERNUT
A member of the walnut family known also as "long walnut" and as "white
walnut" is the true butternut. It has a smaller range of adaptability
than does the black walnut but is found considerably farther north. On
the Atlantic coast, its native range extends into Nova Scotia. In parts
of New York State and New England, it is one of the most common species.
It is well known in Michigan where, to many people it is the favorite of
all nuts. The tree is less durable and long-lived than is the black
walnut. It is less well suited for use in the landscape and its timber
value is probably the least of any native walnut.
Within very recent years one or two promising varieties have been
introduced by the nurserymen. The first and only one now available is
the Aiken from New Hampshire. The nut cracks well and the kernels are of
pleasant flavor, but as a variety it has not been tested long enough to
determine its adaptability to conditions in other states nor the extent
to which budded trees will be productive.
CHESTNUT
Perhaps the greatest, of all tree tragedies is represented by the
chestnut. Once a dominant species in many parts of the East, it is now
merely a wreck of its former self. In whole states along the Atlantic
Seaboard, it has been wiped out by a fungus disease introduced from
Japan some 25 years ago. Pennsylvania allows no chestnut trees to be
shipped outside its limits for fear of further spreading this disease.
So far as known chestnut trees from west of the Wabash River are free
from infection. From Illinois, there have recently been introduced
several varieties of chestnut supposedly of pure American parentage
which are quite the equal in size of the European sorts but which have
the sweet flavor of true American strains. In protected places in the
southern part of the Lower Peninsula these chestnuts should be well
worthy of trial. They are, indeed, splendid chestnuts. The principal
varieties are the Rochester, Progress, Fuller and Boone. The last is not
related to the others; but is the result of an artificial cross between
the American sweet chestnut and the Japan Giant.
HICKORY
Next to, or perhaps equal to the black walnut, the hickories are among
the best known of Michigan's nut trees. Belonging to the same family as
do the walnuts, they require much the same soil for their best
development. They are slower of growth and even harder to bud and graft
or to successfully transplant. Nevertheless, some of hickories bear
splendid nuts in liberal quantities. Quite a number of good varieties
have been named and a few propagated. They are mainly of the shagbark
species although some are shellbarks, some pignuts, and a few hybrids.
The true shellbark is not found in Michigan and would probably not
succeed there as well as do others. In character of growth, the
shellbark is much like the shagbark but the nuts are much larger, and
the shells extremely thick. Among the good shagbarks there are the
Swaim, Weiker, Kentucky, Manahan, Taylor and Vest.
True hickories ordinarily do not attain important habits of bearing
until from 15 to 25 years of age.
PECAN
The pecan is easily the favorite and most important nut of American
origin. Contrary to current ideas, it is not an introduced species nor
are the best pecans grown in California. The pecan has become one of the
leading nuts of this country by rapid but natural processes. In the
forests, it is indigenous as far north as the southern part of Indiana,
and in western Illinois it is found at the latitude of Chicago. Seedling
trees at South Haven and on the campus of Michigan Agricultural College
have borne occasional crops but the climate of Michigan is too severe
for pecans to bear regularly. The trees of northern origin should do
well enough over much of lower Michigan to be worthy of planting. Good
varieties are the Major, Greenriver, Niblack, Indiana, Busseron and
Posey.
BLACK WALNUT
Already the black walnut had been referred to in this article. In its
further behalf may be said that like the pecan it is one of America's
most rapid growing valuable trees. It does not grow with the speed of a
poplar, a willow, or a linden. Neither does any other tree of value or
longevity. Two 6-year-old trees of the eastern black walnut grown in the
Wiliamette Valley of Western Oregon, bore approximately a peck of nuts
apiece, in 1919, when they were photographed by the writer. In good soil
and under favorable conditions of growth, it will be seen that the black
walnut is not always slow in developing but that it is sometimes a rapid
grower.
Three varieties of black walnut are now available from the nurserymen.
They are the Thomas from Pennsylvania, the Ohio from some 20 miles south
of Toledo, and the Stabler from Howard County, Maryland 15 or 20 miles
outside the District of Columbia. All are prolific, precocious and of
superior cracking quality. The Thomas was discovered and first
propagated some 30 years ago. The young grafted trees show a tendency to
begin bearing in the nursery rows.
At the present time, the black walnut is regarded as being of greater
promise for planting in the northern states than is any other species
either native or introduced.
THE JAPANESE WALNUT
To a considerable extent this species has been confused with the Persian
walnut, although the two are quite unlike. This is a dwarfish species
with dull green rough leaflets often as many as 15 or 17 per leaf, which
often bears nuts in clusters of a dozen or more. While green the outer
hulls of the nuts are rough, and somewhat sticky.
The Persian walnut is a standard-sized upright growing tree with bright
green leaflets, usually 5 to 7 per leaf, and smooth, round nut hulls
which split open and shed the nuts automatically.
The Japanese walnuts hybridize freely with other species of walnuts and
produce nuts of all types; not infrequently crosses of this kind
resemble butternuts so closely as to be practically indistinguishable
from them.
True Japanese walnuts have a range in form of two distinct types. The
better known is of guinea egg shape; the other, often known as the
heartnut, is of distinct heart shape. Neither is large; the former is of
about the size of a guinea egg or smaller; the latter is still smaller.
Both are like the black walnut in being encased in a rough outer husk,
which upon maturing shrivels and adheres to the surface of the nut. The
shells are thinner than are those of the black walnut, but thicker than
are those of the Persian walnut. When well matured, the shell of the
heartnut tends to open slightly at the apex, after which it can be
readily split in half with a knife blade. The flavor of the kernel is
much like that of the American butternut.
The Japanese walnut is ordinarily hardy wherever the black succeeds. It
is by no means uncommon in Michigan where it is especially appropriate
for family planting. For the present, seedling trees will have to be
relied upon almost wholly, as very few varieties have been propagated.
So far as the writer is informed, the only named variety available from
a northern nursery is the Lancaster introduced by J. F. Jones, a
nurseryman at Lancaster, Pa.
PERSIAN WALNUT
Perhaps no species of nut tree has attracted as great attention in
Michigan as has the Persian walnut. Under some conditions it does well
for a time in the eastern or northeastern states, but on the whole its
performance is distinctly erratic. Commercially speaking, it is of
importance in this country only on the Pacific coast. Trees on the
campus at Michigan Agricultural College and at many private places in
the central part of the state, have come to little. Usually they grow
well in summer only to freeze back nearly as much in winter. In Saranac
County, eastern Michigan, close to Lake Huron there are a few young
orchards that are in good condition, but a half mile back from the lake
the results are discouraging. The same is true next to Lake Michigan
from Grand Rapids south to the Indiana line.
The only recommendations that can be made relative to planting the
Persian walnut in Michigan are, that it be planted very cautiously in
any part of the state and except under very favored circumstances it be
not at all in the middle of the state.
Do not undertake to grow the trees by planting the nuts or by buying
seedlings. The most desirable trees are those of hardy varieties, budded
on the black walnut as a stock a foot or more above ground.
THE FILBERT
The filbert has been one of our tantalizing species of nut trees. In
England, trees grow to ages of from one to two hundred years, bearing
profusely meanwhile. There, for many years, they are grown under apple
trees with currants below them. In Germany, we are told that
strawberries are grown below the currants and gooseberries. We are
waiting for the Yankee who will be first to grow peanuts or potatoes
below strawberries. In the eastern part of this country, plants of the
European kinds are disappointing in two ways. First, they are uncertain
as to their ability to bear; and second, they are highly susceptible to
a fungus disease found everywhere that the native hazels abound. The
native species is quite able to resist this disease, but the
introductions ordinarily succumb to it quickly.
In the Pacific Northwest, where by many filbert culture is believed
destined to become a successful and paying industry within the next few
years, not infrequently some varieties begin to blossom as early as in
December. The blooming is largely responsible for the failure of eastern
trees to set and mature crops of nuts.
Several nurserymen are now endeavoring to find varieties of commercial
value in the eastern part of the country. Apparently they are meeting
with some success as far as their work has gone. Many of the varieties
they are testing are proving inferior, but a few have borne good nuts in
gratifying quantity for several years. During the past winter, a good
many froze severely, although they are commonly hardy under severe
weather.
Wherever they are planted, they should have fertile soil, from 20 to 25
feet of space each way and should be trained to tree form. After 10
years or so, they should be headed back severely, unless regular pruning
has been practiced in the meantime. Filberts fruit only on new wood.
To those who have read this article to this point, it is now apparent
that the nut industry of Michigan lies almost wholly in the future. The
native varieties form an excellent ground work for that future, but to
properly take advantage of that base, it will be necessary for
practically every nut lover in the state to lend a helping hand. The
first great movement necessary is to examine the nuts in the fall as
ripen in order to find the best of the walnuts, hickories, native
hazels, beeches and introduced chestnuts, walnuts and filberts. In this
everyone can help. Whoever finds a tree of any kind bearing superior
nuts will render a great service by sending specimens, together with his
or her address and that of the owner of the tree to the Federal
Department of Agriculture at Washington, D. C., or to Willard G. Bixby,
Treasurer of the Association, Baldwin, Nassau County, N. Y. Be sure to
carefully note the exact tree, from which the nuts were obtained and if
specimens are sent from more than one tree, they should be kept separate
and each carefully labeled. Such nuts will be examined and if found to
be the equal or superior to the varieties already being grown, they will
be named and arrangements made for this propagation and test.
No prizes are given by the Government but good nuts sent the Government
will be eligible to entry in the contest of the Northern Nut Growers'
Association. If enough specimens are sent the Department, some will be
forwarded to the Treasurer of that Association who has charge of awards.
According to very recent reports, the outlook for a nut crop during the
coming year was never better. This should, therefore, be an excellent
year for finding the trees bearing the best nuts.
PRESIDENT REED: I believe Mr. Reed expects to give an
additional talk tonight with lantern slides.
MR. C. A. REED: There will be an informal talk, a question box
this evening for the benefit of any interested in the general discussion
of nut culture in the United States. I notice the guests of the
institution are deeply interested in nut growing in their particular
states; so the arrangement for this evening is to give those persons an
opportunity to come out and ask questions.
MR. OLCOTT: While Mr. Reed is on that subject, I would like to
ask if there is a chestnut as large as the Boone or other chestnuts
grown by Mr. Riehl of as good flavor as the American Sweet chestnut. A
good many people are asking me from time to time what the merit is in
those large chestnuts. Invariably they have found that the quality is
not as good as in the American sweet chestnut. I have been assured and
Mr. Reed says that the kernel of these is very good. I wonder if there,
are some of them better than others--of the very large chestnuts.
MR. C. A. REED: There is a difference. The Boone that Mr.
Olcott refers to is a cross between the American species and the
Japanese. The Japanese has not a good flavor; it is considerably below
that of the American; but the Boone is quite good; but there are some of
Mr. Riehl's chestnuts that are better. Mr. Riehl's are believed to be
the pure American sweet chestnuts and some of them are very good,
perhaps not quite as sweet as our American sweet, but they are
exceedingly satisfactory and very popular in the Chicago markets where
Mr. Riehl's chestnuts are going.
MR. BIXBY: This fall I received a chestnut which I am satisfied
was Japanese, which is very large, and seemingly about as sweet as the
American. I did not have the American there to test it by, but it was
very interesting to me, and I am planning to get scions in the spring to
follow it up further. It was seemingly a Japanese chestnut, and pretty
nearly as large as the Boone.
MR. J. F. JONES: I might say that so far as I have tested them,
some of the Japanese are quite sweet, but the meat is generally tough,
not brittle and sweet like the American.
PRESIDENT REED: I believe Mr. Linton is with us, and we shall
be glad to hear from him.
NUT TREES FOR HIGHWAYS AND PUBLIC PLACES
WILLIAM S. LINTON, SAGINAW, MICHIGAN
For a number of years it has been a source of gratification and pleasure
to me to be identified with the membership of the Northern Nut Growers'
Association. True, "a long distance membership only," but nevertheless a
connection that all must admit has borne fruit, or nuts, as you may
prefer to state it.
To this association and its official journal must be given full credit
for the pioneer work in a great and good movement that will sweep, not
only over the United States, but over every clime and county in the
world's Western hemisphere as well. Your seed sown in the peninsular
state of Michigan, was the first to sprout in a substantial way in so
far as public planting of nut trees by a sovereign state is concerned,
and it was our good fortune to have as staunch supporters for the plan
such able and persistent workers as my good friend, Senator Harvey A.
Penney of Saginaw, Professor A. K. Chittenden of the Michigan
Agricultural College, and last, but not least, Honorable Frank F.
Rogers, Michigan's excellent State Highway Commissioner. Upon the latter
will largely devolve the duty of carrying out the law's provisions, as
provided in Senator Penney's bill passed at the last session of the
Legislature, and that it will be well and practically done, goes without
saying.
And now to my theme, "Should the Country Roadsides be Planted and Why."
The present high cost of living, and in fact the cost of living at any
time is a fruitful and serious problem. Our vast natural resources
during the century gone, of forests, of game, and of grazing lands, have
almost to the point of extinction been rapidly passing away, and it
behooves us, who have profited thereby and now owe a duty to our race to
artificially provide wherever and whenever we can for the future of
humankind. In what better way can this be done than in utilizing the
immense acreage of America's vast system of highways, (now absolutely
wasted except for the sole purpose of travel), to reproduce the very
finest of our country's magnificent trees, to again afford beauty,
grateful shade, valuable timber and the choicest of food in great
abundance for the generations to come.
Were this not a convention devoted to the advancement of nut growing
alone, I would be glad to extol also for road planting fruit trees of
every kind of adequate size and character, and free or nearly so, from
the ravages of disease or insect pest, would be glad to praise the
stately, hard maple, with its clear, sweet sap, producing the syrup and
sugar that are the delight of childhood and age, and would be glad to
recommend the useful basswood with its valuable lumber and its fragrant
yellow flowers, producing that nectar from which our most delicious
honey is made, and would be glad to recommend for our highways, certain
other majestic trees needed by man and beautiful in the landscape.
But the object of this association and convention is a specialized one,
as undoubtedly it should be, owing to the important field it covers, and
therefore the nut trees and it alone for planting on highways and in
public places should be the subject of this paper.
If we were to confine ourselves to one native variety or species for our
Northern territory, the great majority of people would unhesitatingly
say, let it be the Black Walnut (_Juglans nigra_). Attaining as it does
a height of 100 feet and more, and a trunk of four feet and over in
diameter, with a symmetrical top of splendid foliage, bearing the
richest of nuts and its timber the most valuable in the country, with a
natural range extending from Michigan to Mississippi and from Delaware
to the Dakotas, it should be universally planted throughout the United
States along thousands of miles of our great trunk line roads.
Its nearest American relative, the butternut (_Juglans cinerea_)
preferring lower lands along river bottoms, attaining an average height
of 60 feet with a trunk of 3 feet, its wood suitable for cabinet work,
its bark with medicinal properties, and its nuts of splendid flavor,
should be planted where soil conditions call for it.
For their rich, delicious nuts, alone, saying nothing about their clean,
handsome foliage, their rough, strong wood--the best of any grown for
many purposes--the hickories, among which are the Shagbark (_Carya
ovata_) and the big shellbark (_Carya laciniosa_), should be planted in
many places. They both frequently attain 100 feet in height with
straight sturdy trunks averaging from three to four feet in diameter.
The other nut trees suitable for roadside planting, are not specially
attractive to mankind for their fruits, as heretofore used or utilized,
but may eventually become so under modern methods of cooking or proper
treatment. In their raw state, however, all are edible and also
palatable to most people, but their chief food value today, is to
provide rich provender to domestic animals and birds, or the desirable
wild life of the woodlands, all of which devour them eagerly, adding
quickly to their weight and greatly to their quality and flavor of their
flesh. I refer to the three magnificent oaks producing sweet acorns,
viz., the White Oak (_Quercus albaq_), the Bur Oak (_Quercus
macrocarpa_) and the Swamp White Oak (_Quercus plantanoides_). They are
all emblematic of great strength and grandeur, reaching the majestic
height of 100 feet, with trunks four or five feet in diameter; the leaf
coloring at times is indescribably beautiful and the timber owing to its
great solidity and strength is of the utmost value.
Last, but not least, the American beech, with a three or four foot trunk
and almost 100 feet in height, distinct and beautiful, will demand the
attention of those who plant our highways. Its nuts, feasted upon by
many forest denizens, may be classed with the sweet acorns heretofore
referred to, but the tree has a grace and charm all its own and it
thrives from the warm waters of the Gulf to the icy shores of Lake
Superior.
At this time we cannot recommend what has been a noble, almost
fascinating tree, 100 feet its usual height and sometimes spreading 100
feet almost in extent, with a trunk that in some cases reached a
diameter of 10 feet, with clusters of golden catkins fragrant in
midsummer, resulting in great quantities of delicious nuts in autumn.
Such was the chestnut, _Castanea dentata_, of the past, the fate of
which, and almost extinction, has been a tragedy in the ranks of our
native trees that has brought bitter regrets to all lovers of this
partician of the forest. Good news comes from the far East, however, to
the effect that some specimens of this famous tree have escaped or
proven immune to the blight, and if the latter, it means the saving of
the species and its replanting in soil and territory where it may thrive
as of yore.
Having now enumerated the varieties of trees that should be selected in
the main for the planting of highways and in public places, the question
now arises as to the best method of carrying on the work in a practical
way throughout the country.
Individuals or small communities certainly can not be depended upon to
do it, as the result would be of a patchwork character that would not be
pleasing to the eye or beneficial in its results.
Only federal, state and municipal governments can take charge of this
great work and carry it forward to completion.
The State of Michigan, now as you know, by legal enactment, causes state
authorities to plant the trunk line, highways, the county to plant the
roads of the county systems, and the cities and villages and townships
those minor roads that are within their borders.
In case of individual effort, where an owner of land plants
food-producing trees along the highways in front of his property, he is
reimbursed by stated amounts covering each tree so planted, the returns
coming to him by a reduction in the amount of his own taxation.
This so-called Michigan plan carried on throughout the entire country,
would call for a supply of trees of the character named far beyond the
ability of the commercial growers to supply, and in my opinion can be
worked out only by seed or seedlings of the various varieties. And why
not? The cost would be much less than of any other method, and only a
few years would pass before substantial returns would commence to come.
It has been stated and it is true, that the seeds of the trees named do
not always produce superior nuts, but in a great majority only those of
a common or inferior kind. However, choice specimens will appear also,
and from these of the better class grafting may be done to enrich all.
Then again, it is a question as to whether the important tap roots of
the important nut species should be disturbed or destroyed in
transplanting. It would seem to be the proper plan, therefore, in order
to avoid too great an expense, that the nuts or seed should be used in a
great majority of highway planting, the trees to remain where first
placed on approved roadside lines, and the proper distance apart.
It may be said that too great a time would elapse between the planting
of the seed and the maturity of the tree, but as time goes nowadays, it
would not be an unreasonable period, and there are those within the
sound of my voice now, who will witness in their maturity the
magnificent trees producing their valuable products and adding to the
beauty of the landscape and to the welfare of mankind.
This Association has been the pioneer in this great movement, and it
will be the credit to those connected therewith in the generations to
come, in that they have all contributed in a very marked degree to the
everlasting benefit of mankind.
PRESIDENT REED: Is there any discussion?
MR. C. A. REED: I believe Senator Penney is to discuss a topic
very closely affiliated with this one and perhaps it would be well to
defer the discussion until we hear his address.
PRESIDENT REED: We will be glad to have Senator Penney present
his paper next, then. It is along the same lines--legislation in regard
to tree planting.
SENATOR PENNEY: When my friend, Mr. Linton, started off to
discuss his paper, he said he was a long distance member, and you can
see the effect in the fruits he has borne or the nuts he has borne. Ever
since I was taken sick up north, he has been trying to tell me I was a
nut. I was taken sick up there in the deer hunting camp, and my friend,
Mr. Linton, assisted in getting me out and rushing me to the nearest
hospital, and it happened to be an insane asylum in northern Michigan.
LEGISLATION REGARDING THE PLANTING OF NUT AND OTHER FOOD PRODUCING TREES
SENATOR HARVEY A. PENNEY, SAGINAW, MICHIGAN
I wish to express my hearty appreciation to your Association for the
distinct honor of being invited to address your meeting upon the subject
of "Legislation Regarding the Planting of Nut and Other Food Trees." I
believe that my invitation came as a result of having been responsible
for introducing a tree-planting bill in the Senate of the 1919 session
of the Michigan State Legislature, and later in securing its passage.
This bill purported "to regulate the planting of ornamental,
nut-bearing and other food-producing trees along the highways of the
State of Michigan, or in public places, and for the maintenance,
protection and care of such trees, and to provide a penalty for injury
thereof, or for stealing the products thereof."
For several sessions of the Michigan Legislature prior to 1919, bills
had been introduced intending to accomplish this result, but each time
heretofore they have regularly failed to pass. This fate included one
introduced by the writer during the session of 1917. I am now fully
convinced that none of these bills, although a step in the right
direction, seemed to provide the proper working machinery or necessary
features to put them into practical operation, and hence did not appeal
to the legislative committees, nor to the members of the several
legislatures.
During the regular session of 1919, with the valuable assistance of Hon.
W. S. Linton of Saginaw, a new bill was prepared providing an entirely
new method of supplying and planting such trees, and for putting such a
law into effective operation under the jurisdiction of the state. It was
made to work in harmony with the rights of the property owner adjoining
the highway, and with the duties of those state officials whose
departments were perfectly adapted and equipped for putting the law into
active operation.
I am going to attach an enrolled copy of the tree planting bill at the
end of this paper, so that it may be made a part of the permanent
records of the Association. It will therefore be unnecessary to give a
detailed account of all the provisions contained therein.
I will, however, mention a few of the principal points so that you may
understand its purpose. It provides that the Public Domain Commission
which has charge of the state forest reserve lands and parks, together
with the Michigan Agricultural College, are given authority to grow and
acquire suitable seeds, scions or trees for planting under the
provisions of this act. A department of the Agricultural College
determines the kind of trees which are adapted or suitable for planting
in different soils or places. In order to insure a uniform system of
planting, this duty is left to the State Highway Commission and the
State Board of Agriculture, acting jointly. The trees belong to the
state, but the nuts or other products belong to the owner of the land
adjoining the highway. A penalty is imposed if these trees are defaced
with advertisements or signs, and neither can they be cut down or
destroyed.
But just as you find legislatures differing in their opinions upon
public matters, so you must expect them to differ more or less upon the
feasibility of most any bill that is presented for their consideration.
All kinds of arguments are made for and against any bill. I remember
that one Senator in the committee thought that trees planted along the
highways bearing nuts or fruit would constantly be subject to a lot of
tampering and molestation by the traveling public. But another Senator
came back with a reply that seemed to be very convincing, when he stated
that he had a fine row of cherry trees growing along the front of his
farm, and had never experienced any trouble of that kind from such a
source.
I have always felt that if the merits of a good bill were properly
explained to a legislature committee, there will be no hesitancy in
having it favorably reported out and finally passed. I believe the
legislature of 1919 took this view of the tree planting bill introduced
by myself, as it was passed by both the Senate and the House, and later
received the signature of Governor Sleeper, thus making it an
established law of Michigan.
I must not forget to mention the fact that after this bill had been
passed by the legislature and still needed the signature of the Governor
to make it a law, a number of Michigan's representative and influential
citizens wrote to Governor Sleeper, urging him to affix his signature
thereto. Among those was Dr. J. H. Kellogg of Battle Creek, who has more
than a nation-wide reputation in his profession and is at present a
strong factor in the success of this association.
This law is intended not only to ornament the public highways of
Michigan, but also to furnish nut bearing and other food-producing trees
that should assist materially in the problems incident to the high cost
of living. It would seem that such a law should be duplicated in every
state where practicable, and also be promoted by the National Government
upon National Highways.
The people of Michigan recently voted to amend the State Constitution so
as to permit the issuance of $50,000,000.00 worth of bonds for the
improvement of public highways. By the time that this large sum has been
apportioned over a period of say ten years, and the road moneys
furnished and expended during this time, as federal aid by the federal
government, local counties and townships are added thereto, it has been
estimated that the vast sum of nearly $200,000,000.00 will have been
used solely for the improvement of our state highways.
With a wonderful highway system thus established, beautifully adorned by
the state with nut-bearing and other trees, the roads of Michigan should
become a great attraction in which our citizens would not only have a
just pride, but serve as a model of excellence for the whole nation to
imitate.
MR. C. A. REED: Mr. President, I would like to ask the Senator
what danger there is likely to be in the protection of these trees when
they are once planted. Is the tree going to have right of way, or is the
telephone company going to have right of way in cutting out the top; or
is a new bred consciousness going to have authority. If it is possible
that the trees will be destroyed as many have been, perhaps the
legislation may be changed in some way. Suppose we want to give them
good care, what are we going to do?
SENATOR PENNEY: The law has a section in it providing for
defacing and damaging the trees or cutting them down. I have a copy of
the bill there. As my throat is in bad shape perhaps it might be well to
have the secretary read the bill. It is not very long.
MR. LINTON: In this connection I would also ask for the reading
of the bill by the secretary. This is a bill that may be copied by other
states throughout the Union, and if there is any criticism that is just,
in reason, for changing any of the features in the bill, they should be
decided upon at this meeting or by a committee. Because a uniform bill
throughout the country is really something desirable, I think, in
connection with this legislation. And I would add further: Michigan does
not have an entire monopoly of Highway legislation at the present time,
but is in a prominent position in connection therewith. The chairman of
the committee on post offices and post roads of the United States Senate
is Senator Townsend, of this State. It is his bill that will cause the
national highways to be constructed from ocean to ocean. Senator
Townsend is one of our best beloved citizens; his heart is in this work;
and I am sure from what I know of him (and he is a close friend of mine)
that he will enter heartily into the spirit of embodying in national
legislation something of the character that we have in state legislation
in Michigan so that it may apply to the whole country as well. And for
that reason I would like to have the bill read. It is a short one, and
any additions or any amendments thereto I know will be gladly received
by Senator Penny or myself.
MR. OLCOTT: Mr. President, I think that is one of the most
important subjects that can come before this Association; not only
that, but the interest of every member should be enlisted particularly
in this subject. The possibilities of the extension of that work are
almost unlimited and directly in line with the objects of this
organization.
PRESIDENT REED: I am just wondering whether we would have time
to have it read now, or postpone it to a little later. Dr. Kellogg is
with us now.
MR. BIXBY: This bill is very short. (Read bill.)
Senate Bill No. 59 Introduced by Senator Penney
(File No. 150)
STATE OF MICHIGAN
50th Legislature
Regular Session of 1919
SENATE ENROLLED ACT NO. 18
An act to regulate the planting of ornamental, nut bearing or other
food producing trees along the highways of the State of Michigan,
or in public places, and for the maintenance, protection and care
of such trees and to provide a penalty for injury thereof, or for
stealing the products thereof.
The People of the State of Michigan enact
Section 1. The State Highway Commissioner and the State Board of
Agriculture, acting jointly hereunder, shall have authority and it
shall be their duty to select and plant by seed, scions or
otherwise, ornamental, nut bearing, or other food producing trees,
(to be supplied by the Public Domain Commission, or the Michigan
Agricultural College, as may be recommended or approved by the
Division of Agriculture of said college,) suitable for shade trees,
along the State trunk line highways and all other highways of the
State of Michigan, upon which State reward has been paid or earned:
Provided, that in no case shall such trees be planted except by and
with the consent of the owner of the property adjoining such
highway. The State Highway Commissioner shall establish rules and
regulations for uniform planting or proper placing of all trees
under the provisions of this act, and all such trees shall belong
to the State, but the products thereof shall belong to the owners
of the adjacent land. Nothing herein contained shall authorize the
State Highway Commissioner, or the State Board of Agriculture to
cut down or interfere with shade trees now growing along any such
highway, without permission in writing from the owner of the
adjoining property. All expenses incurred in carrying out the
provisions of this section shall be paid out of any moneys in the
State highway fund that may be available therefor.