should remember and act on, it is that low cost food reserves should be
provided against possible exigencies. They are not needed every year but
when needed their value can hardly be estimated. Only to a limited
extent can such reserves be accumulated out of the production of our
ordinary cereals and commonly cultivated crops. Potential reserves in
the form of fruitful nut trees can be established at relative light
initial investment or of continuing care and labor on almost every farm
and by many a roadside in much of our farming territory. Black walnut,
butternut, shag bark, shell bark, beech and other hardy, long-lived
native trees can be established at low cost in large numbers for beauty,
shade, and food production. Nor should the possibilities of Persian
walnut, Japanese walnut, and native hazel be disregarded in favored
sections.
While none of these are entirely free from plant diseases or insect
pests, they are, when once established, capable of maintaining
themselves fairly clean and sound with little expenditure for spraying
or other attention during the growing season when the peak load
activities of the farm are on. Why should not their planting receive
more attention and encouragement from our horticultural and other rural
societies? For rough land and roadside planting they are decidedly more
practical in most sections than any of our fruit trees, substantially
all of which require spraying and tillage to maintain productiveness, or
in fact to avoid becoming nuisances by harboring pests to contaminate
the commercial orchards of the neighborhoods. While much has been said
in America in commendation of the roadside planting of fruit trees so
common in portions of Europe, and while there are possibilities of
useful development along this line, most American efforts in this
direction have proved disappointing because of the impracticability of
giving the trees the care and attention they require. While often
promising at the start they have quickly become infested with San Jose
and other scales, borers, blights and rots which can only be prevented
or controlled by systematic and thorough remedial measures, rarely
possible on rough lands, in fence rows and on roadsides.
If this type of nut culture is sufficiently promising to be worth while,
do we not need to attack its problems from a somewhat different angle
than has become our custom with the trees which are to be grown under
intensive cultural conditions at high maintenance cost, such as more and
more characterizes our orcharding?
It has seemed to me for some time that in this field we need to return
in our study of varieties and strains of nut trees to the standards and
ideals of the earlier and ruder period of American Pomology when
rusticity of tree, including storm endurance, freedom from troublesome
diseases and insect pests, as well as productiveness and dessert quality
were the primary consideration next after satisfactory productiveness
and quality of crop.
This and other like societies might well devote much effort to the
securing of performance records of promising individual nut trees,
whether wild or grown by man, with a view to locating those which,
whether bearing nuts of the largest size and finest quality or not,
possess the inherent ability to bear regular crops of fair quality under
the rough and humble conditions of the average fence row or roadside of
the region to which they are adapted. Can a more alluring and
fascinating field for search throughout the growing season be suggested
or one more likely to interest the growing army of nature lovers,
whether dwellers in country or town?
Once located and proved worth while through a sufficient period of
cropping such trees, especially of black walnut, could be made available
through nursery propagation for rapid dissemination for experimental
planting throughout the areas of their probable adaptability.
Do not understand me as in any sense discouraging the continuance of
painstaking experimentation with a view to finding or developing
varieties suited to orchard planting in those scattered, favored spots
where conditions make success reasonably probable. My point is rather
that in our northern states by far the largest potential production of
nuts is through waste land utilization and dual or triple purpose
planting, such as nuts and shade and in some cases ultimate yield of
highly valuable timber.
In short, widespread recognition of the importance of nut-tree planting
as a side line. This deserves attention during the next few years
because of the practical certainty that as our nationwide development of
permanent highways proceeds, roadside trees planting on a large scale is
sure to follow. When undertaken it should be on a solid foundation of
experience especially with regard to the climatic adaptation, soil and
drainage requirements, varietal characteristics, such as habit, vigor,
pest resistance, and productiveness, all of which are fundamentally
important where the use of the land for a century or more is involved.
What has been said with regard to highway planting is still more
important with regard to the planting of the farmstead where ill-suited
trees become a source of grief rather than of satisfaction.
Side-line planting of nut trees in our northern states is practically
sure to develop on a large scale during the next twenty-five years.
How can the essentials to its rational development be most promptly and
accurately determined and most effectively disseminated among the
people?
DR. MORRIS: Apropos of side line planting, Mr. Jones some three or four
years ago gave me a very handy little orchard saw. He said that when I
went around the orchard on Sunday morning before church time if I had
this saw with me I would find something to do. Well when I have this saw
in my hand before church I find so much to do that I cannot go to
church. Now if we take up tree planting as a side line it is going to be
the little cap that will fire off the big gun. I think we may safely
urge side line planting of nut trees believing that men who take up the
side line will be drawn into putting them out on the very best land they
have.
THE SECRETARY TREASURER: Dr. Taylor said "if the trees were suited to
the climatic conditions." I would like to ask him about that. I get many
requests from people from various parts of the country as to what trees
would succeed in their sections. As a matter of assistance in the future
I would like to ask Dr. Taylor how he would go about finding that out.
DR. TAYLOR: Mr. President, my first step I think would be to put that
question to my neighbor who had been there longer than I, who had had
his eyes open and who had had opportunity to observe. There is great
risk in undertaking to project into investment propositions theoretical
considerations with respect to particular varieties of trees. Our guide,
our only guide, must be actual, observed behavior of the trees that we
have under consideration. Of course we can draw some broadly general
lines. We do well in a matter of this character to draw those lines
rather conservatively and make clear that he who passes beyond the line
does so at his own risk. He does it deliberately experimentally rather
than upon what you might call an investment basis. The important thing,
it seems to me at this stage is to observe and record the facts with
respect to the trees now growing. That, of course, is particularly true
with regard to the native trees which, without doubt, must take the lead
in side line planting throughout the northern states. That is to my mind
the important thing. Trees exist in large numbers. They need to be
located and studied not merely observed on one bright sunny afternoon
when everything tends towards satisfaction and optimism, but through the
eyes in a way that will make available not only to the observer but to
the rest of us the facts in regard to those trees.
THE PRESIDENT: The next number on our program is Tree Planting for
Definite Purposes, by Charles Lathrop Pack, President of the American
Forestry Association. Mr. Pack has notified us that he is unable to be
present, but has forwarded his paper.
GREATEST POWER PRODUCING ENGINE IS THE NUT TREE--MAKE NUT TREES YOUR
MIDDLE MAN IN FIGHTING FOOD COST
CHARLES LATHROP PACK, PRESIDENT, THE AMERICAN FORESTRY ASSOCIATION
On every hand we hear the call for power and more power. Every
scientific genius in the world directs his attention to increasing power
units in the struggle for world trade on which we are entering following
a World War. Business calls for quicker transportation and the motor
world answers with master motors; railroads are being or have been
electrified; water power developments are being pushed in many parts of
the country. The business world calls for more power and the aeroplanes
answer with the delivery of mail and soon we are told it will enter the
strictly commercial field. But what of man? What is being done to make
him stand up under this terrific strain; this keener competition? What
of the food that must keep him going? What of products that must be put
before him with the middle man standing between?
A nut bearing tree is the most powerful engine in the world if its
fruits be properly used. If the people of the United States could have
nut bearing trees for their "middlemen" in the fight to bring down the
High Cost of Living it would come down quickly.
Nuts are the most important of all tree crops because they are the
richest natural food substance known. A nut is Nature's supreme effort
to pack as much nourishment as she can into the smallest possible space
for the nourishment of the future young plant. That some people are
aware of these food values is evidenced in the nationwide tree balloting
now being conducted by the American Forestry Association for the
selection of a national tree. In this voting nut bearing trees are in
the lead. Many nuts contain as much musclebuilding food as rich cheese,
a third more than beef steak, twice as much fat as cheese, five times as
much as eggs. Chestnuts contain 70 per cent of starch, nearly as much as
the best wheat flour and four times as much as potatoes. Peanuts and
hickory nuts are three times as nourishing as beefsteak. When you think
of it that way it hardly seems to be the thing to casually munch triple
extract of beefsteak from a street nut stand or after a hearty dinner.
Say a fifty-pound bushel of black walnuts costs two dollars. It yields
12-1/2 pounds of meats whose fuel, or food value is 37,500 calories. The
same number of calories in beefsteak at fifty cents a pound would cost
more than fifteen dollars. A bushel of hickory nuts at three dollars
yields as many calories as sixteen dollars' worth of round steak.
Out in Kansas the other day a single walnut tree stump, grubbed out on
the banks of a creek in Geary County brought the farmer $250. When the
call of war came we found we had to hunt for black walnut to make gun
stocks and aeroplane propellers. In some towns in Ohio, citizens cut the
walnut from their streets so high was the price offered for this wood.
So let us make trees, particularly nut bearing trees, the memorials or
the proper setting for memorials to the men who offered their lives to
their country in the World War. Let us line our highways with trees and
make them Roads of Remembrance. In this way the trees will impress their
value upon millions of our people. Put these trees where they can spread
the message of production and beautification combined. Take their seeds
and pass them on to other places where the message will be spread still
further.
Michigan is planting apple trees along a Victory Highway. Tourists will
pick those apples some day. That is just what Michigan wants them to do.
Michigan wants the tourists to carry the fame of Michigan's apples to
the southern tip of Florida and to the northern tip of Montana. Why do
not your members of this Association of nut growers follow the example
of Michigan by planting nut trees along the highways of the state they
represent. The American Forestry Association is glad to co-operate with
anyone who wants to spread the message of the tree. The people of this
country have a responsive ear to campaigns of education. The American
Forestry Association's call for memorial tree planting has demonstrated
this. Trees are being planted by the American Legion, the Service Star
Legion, schools, church congregations, all sorts of organizations and
individuals throughout the country. The tree is the one thing with its
ever renewing life symbol that meets the requirements of a memorial. The
tree is the memorial the individual can erect, care for and protect.
Then just consider what the tree gives the planter in return--an
affection that only comes from the bosom of the earth, to which the
loved one for whom the tree was planted, has returned.
You gentlemen are missing a great opportunity if you do not get squarely
behind the American Forestry Association and help it spread the message
of the tree, Nature's masterpiece and greatest gift to man, and in doing
so urge the value of planting trees that produce food wherever such
trees can give better service than those which do not produce food.
* * * * *
THE PRESIDENT: The next number on our program is A Nursery of Improved
Filberts, by Conrad Vollertsen, of Rochester, N. Y.
A NURSERY OF IMPROVED FILBERTS
CONRAD VOLLERTSEN, ROCHESTER, N. Y.
Again I have prepared a paper on the growing of Improved European
hazelnuts, but through practical experience perhaps a little more
positive in my statements.
It is well known, a well established fact, that our common native
American hazelnuts both Corylus rostrata the beaked hazel, and Corylus
Americana the American hazel in their present state of appearance are
for various reasons not very well adapted nor desirable for cultivation,
particularly Corylus rostrata, a very slow growing variety with unusual
small and hard shelled nuts, so small and hard that even the rodents of
field and forest refuse to gather and eat them. The only value I can see
in this variety is that it may prove to be a good pollenizer. Corylus
Americana is a better grower with nuts a little longer than the
preceding variety, but a short life plant and therefore not even fit to
use for stock to graft on and should never be used for that purpose.
There is in fact by both varieties lots of room for improvement, which
only could be gained through scientific hybridization and which we hope
will be realized to a certain extent at least in a comparative few
years.
It is true a few better varieties of the American type like the Rush
hazel and one or two others have been discovered or produced, but even
they do not favorably compare with the better European varieties and the
consequences are: If we want to grow hazel-nuts, we are at the present
time and until such time has arrived, when through scientific
hybridization substantial improvements over the present state and
condition of our native hazel-nuts has been gained, actually compelled
to rely on some of the European varieties, compelled to grow and
cultivate a large assortment, from which to select the proper varieties
for the different sections of our country.
I therefore have chosen as a title to my paper The Growing of Improved
European Hazel-nuts in Nursery and Orchards in the State of New York and
other Eastern and Northeastern States. I have chosen this title, because
it indicates that a nursery of European hazel-plants is in existence and
that orchards are planted, which is really equivalent with growing of
European hazel-nuts for commercial purposes, otherwise there would be
no need of such nurseries and no need of hazel-orchards.
I have alluded to this very subject in an earlier paper, but was at that
time not as convinced of the final success as I am today.
We have since not only experienced a very severe and constant winter but
a winter in a great many ways rather peculiar and unusual with early and
heavy snowfall, which prevented in some sections of the eastern states
the freezing of the ground in spite of the bitter cold. We have since
seen another season of buds and blossoms and balmy breezes passing away
never to return and a season of harvesting our fruit is rapidly
approaching its end, but, ladies and gentlemen, during this now
vanishing and for some sections of our country rather peculiar season,
great opportunities were offered the close observer to study and
investigate the different problems concerning the growing of European
hazel-nuts in the northeastern states of our country.
Let us hope that not all of these opportunities and chances offered us
have passed unobserved, but that some of those perplexed questions of
filbert or hazel-nut growing in the east have been solved. To me this
past season, though somewhat unusual, was very interesting and above all
very instructive to growers of hazel-nuts.
It is my opinion that the peculiarity of this season has wonderfully
aided to solve many of those unanswered questions about the growing of
European hazel-nuts for commercial purposes in the Eastern States.
Through practical experience and close observation throughout the whole
season it certainly has convinced me beyond the slightest doubt in my
mind that some varieties of European improved hazel-nuts properly
selected for the different states or parts of the Eastern States can be
profitably grown for commercial purposes. It will of course require time
and work to find out the right and proper varieties for the different
sections of our country. For Western New York I could select eight or
ten varieties from my nursery that would prove A No. 1 for that part of
the state of New York, probably a number of the same varieties would do
equally as well in parts of adjacent states, but of that we are not sure
until actual planting has been done and thoroughly tried out. The
question now is how and where can we obtain the necessary varieties of
hazel-plants, as the importation of most kinds of nursery stock,
including all nutbearing trees from foreign countries is at the present
time very much restricted, practically prohibited. To my judgment there
is but one way out of this, if we want to grow hazel-nuts of foreign
origin.
We are under the existing circumstances, as stated before, simply
compelled to grow our own plants. And this is being done. And to prove
that it can be successfully done I will try to describe and demonstrate
the method I am using or employing in my nursery for propagating the
hazel- or filbert-plants. I still adhere to layering as the best method
of propagating the hazel, large numbers can be produced in a comparative
short time, if sufficient stock-plants are at hand; and plants on their
own roots have many advantages over grafted or budded stock, as there is
no wild growth to combat with, so deceiving and aggravating to the
people who plant hazel-nuts and liable to choke or kill the growth or
bud, that eventually nothing but the wild stock will remain.
The general assertion or claim, that grafted or budded hazel-plants are
more productive, more prolific, than plants on their own roots does not
hold good to all varieties, as I have both grafted plants, as well as
plants on their own roots of bearing age and have so far not been able
to see any difference in bearing, now in the size of the fruit or nuts,
but would like to have it strictly understood that this opinion of mine,
gained through experience and observation in my nursery only should not
be taken as final, as I only have a few grafted varieties to watch and
to compare. In fact I have every reason to believe that grafted
hazel-plants of some varieties, will be more prolific and bear more
regular, but have had so far no proof of it, but will do more grafting
of other varieties to establish the fact more positive and report the
result later. For the buying public at the present time, plants raised
from layers on their own roots should be preferable and layering as a
method of propagating the hazel-plants resorted to until the general
public gets more and better acquainted and familiar with the growing of
hazel-plants.
The layering of hazel-plants in my nursery is done from imported stock
or parent-plants planted on ordinary farm land thoroughly worked and
well manured 12 feet apart each way. Two year old plants are selected
for such planting, they are allowed to grow about two seasons before we
layer them, which would be about in the autumn of the second year, at
that time there should be besides the ordinary growth of the original
plant, some fine young shoots growing from the root, which could be, if
go desired, layered together with other branches of the plant, but is
not always advisable, neither is it necessary, as the plants selected
for parent stock should be well branched and well able to furnish wood
enough for the first layering without those one year old shoots.
I will now try to show to you, as an illustration and at the same time
try to explain the reason why they should not be layered, simply because
they are there. It is all well and good to layer them, if the scarcity
of wood of a choice variety demands every branch obtainable and they
will grow all right, but will never produce as nice a root as layers
from a two year growth. These are the young so-called one-year-old
shoots I have referred to, really just this season's growth, perfectly
straight without any laterals. Now in layering them a little opening
long enough for the branch and about 3 to 4 inches deep, the same as for
layering other branches should be made in the ground and the young shoot
or branch carefully bent and placed in the opening and well anchored or
fastened before the ground is filled in again, otherwise our changeable
winters may heave and loosen them, we will then at the best of it
eventually grow but one plant from each of such shoots and generally
poorly rooted at that, that is a root rather long and crooked not very
easy to plant and still harder to dig, very much like this specimen a
layered one year old shoot, just taken from a parent plant.
We cannot improve much on this awkward root as it is impossible to
shorten the bend in layering them, but we can improve on them, if we
allow the one year shoot or growth another season to grow, we will then
at the end of the second season have an altogether different branch
before us, a branch in appearance about like the one I have here. You
will notice the terminal bud of the last year's growth has made a growth
of about 12 to 15 inches during this second season, besides that, you
will see from 4 to 7 fine laterals all of them including the growth from
the terminal bud fit for layering and all of them will bend easily and
can be placed almost perfectly straight in the ground, which will
invariably insure finer and better rooted plants and more of them, than
a one year growth can produce, as is shown in this specimen from
a-two-year-old branch I have brought with me, this demonstration plainly
shows that there is nothing lost in waiting two years with the layering
of young branches, as our reward will be more and better plants possibly
a little smaller, but better growing plants than the longer layers from
a one-year growth, besides that, a branch with 4 to 7 laterals can be
layered about as quick, as a one-year growth, as the same opening in the
ground made for one layer is fully sufficient for 6 or 7 on a two-year
old branch. All layered branches or little shoots should be cut back to
about 3-4 eyes above the ground and remain in the ground about one year,
the earth around the parent plants and between the layers must be well
worked throughout the whole season and if necessary mulched with half
rotten manure. After the layers are well rooted, they should be taken
up, cut apart and properly trimmed and planted in the nursery row, where
they remain until large enough for market or orchard planting. There is
but very little pruning of the young hazel-plants necessary until they
are planted in the orchard. I will therefore not dwell on the subject of
pruning just now, but will leave the propagating and growing of the
hazel or filbert-plants in the nursery and try to make a few remarks
about the hazel or filbert orchard. I should perhaps have mentioned the
growing of seedlings for stock to graft or bud upon before I begin my
talk on the hazel-orchard, but as there is but very little to be said
about it, I may as well refer to it right now.