luxuriant growth. The next slide shows the methods of propagation. This
is the first step in the operation. The knife is similar to those on the
tables in the Court House. The next slide shows the second stage in the
operation where the bark has been lifted and Mr. Rush holds the bud of
the Persian walnut in the fingers of his left hand, and the next slide
shows the bud in position and being held firmly by a finger of the left
hand. As soon as it is in position like that, Mr. Rush lifts the
pencil--the instrument that he holds in the right hand and folds the
bark back over the new bud and then cuts it on the outside, so that he
makes a perfect fit. If anything, the bark of the black walnut overlaps
slightly the bark of the bud, and the third step in the operation is the
wrapping. Below, right at this point, is a completed operation. That was
done in August, using buds of the present season's growth, and in about
how many days is it that you take off the wrapping?
Mr. Rush: About two weeks.
Mr. Reed: In about two weeks take off the wrapping; and about how much
longer is it before you get a growth like that?
Mr. Rush: About two weeks more, three weeks more.
Mr. Reed: In about four or five weeks from the time of the operation a
growth like that is not uncommon.
Prof. Smith: When is the top cut off?
Mr. Rush: When I see that growth is taking place I cut the top off in
order to encourage the growth to get strong enough for the winter. Of
course our object is to keep the bud dormant until the following season,
perfectly dormant, but sometimes they do make a growth and, if they do,
cut them off at the top and force them. You will not get that bud to
grow next summer, but another bud starts out below that branch and gives
you your tree.
Mr. Reed: That one dies then?
Mr. Rush: Yes, sir, invariably dies.
Mr. Reed: There is one of Mr. Rush's own growing of the Rush walnut, a
little tree which, in its second season, matured two nuts. That
photograph was taken just about the time the nuts were ready to be
gathered.
Mr. Corsan: I noticed in the nurseries at the Michigan Agricultural
College, a lot of black walnuts that were sun-scalded. They were too far
apart. Can anyone tell us anything about this danger of sun-scald to the
trunk?
Mr. Reed: Well, in this particular instance, the tree stands right next
to a fence, so it is protected from the hot sun during a large part of
the season. Perhaps Mr. Rush could tell us whether he has had any
trouble with sun-scald.
Mr. Rush: Not at all, none whatever, never.
The Chairman: There is, in some localities, a great deal of danger from
sun-scald. In the vicinity of Stamford, Conn., most of the English
walnuts will sun-scald more or less unless we look out for that and give
them shade; mostly in the trunk below the branches.
Mr. Lake: How about the nuts?
The Chairman: I haven't seen any scalding there.
Mr. Reed: These are all interesting points and I am glad to have them
thrown in. Mr. Rush can tell us about this slide. It is one of the
cut-leafed varieties of walnut from California that he is propagating.
It is more of an ornament than it is a commercial nut, isn't it?
Mr. Rush: It is both combined. It is very productive and very hardy. The
nut is not quite as large as the Nebo. It is the cut-leafed weeping
walnut. The first tree that came from California cost twenty dollars. It
is very ornamental.
Mr. Reed: This is a view of a seedling Persian walnut orchard in Bucks
county, this state, some twenty or thirty miles north of Philadelphia.
It is now about ten years of age and is owned by Mrs. J. L. Lovett, of
Emilie. Some of the nuts of this orchard are on exhibition over in the
Court House. The orchard was not given any special cultivation at the
time this photograph was taken. The nuts from the trees, of course, are
very ununiform, being seedlings, and the bearing of the trees is not
especially large, but the apparent thrift and vigor of these trees gives
a good deal of ground for looking forward to a walnut industry in the
eastern states.
Prof. Smith: Do you know the origin of the seed?
Mr. Reed: No, sir, we do not. The nuts from which those trees were
planted were obtained and planted by Mr. Lovett who is now deceased.
The Chairman: One of the most important features, it seems to me, of
grafting, is the idea that we can graft from prolific trees. The
majority of trees, of walnuts, hickories, anything you please, are not
remarkably prolific, but in grafting you select a tree that is prolific
as one of the most desirable of its qualities.
A Member: You say that this grove was given no particular cultivation;
are they careful to allow all the foliage to remain on the ground where
it drops?
Mr. Reed: I couldn't answer as to that.
A Member: Mr. Sober, do you do that?
Col. Sober: Yes, sir.
A Member: The point I wanted to make is that that is probably very much
better than any cultivation that could be given.
The Chairman: The matter of cultivation is one we have got to settle in
this country. I have been over the walnut orchards on the Pacific coast,
in the East and in Europe, and I find three entirely separate and
distinct methods of treatment. On the Pacific coast, the rule is to
cultivate every year and irrigate where they can, but to cultivate, at
any rate, whether they irrigate or not. In the East, where people are
supposed to be very industrious, we have adopted the lazier way of
letting the trees grow in sod; but that is not so bad if we follow the
principle brought forward by Stringfellow of letting the leaves all
decompose, and adding more fertilizer and more leaves and taking away
nothing. In France and Germany and England, where the trees are
cultivated, particularly in France, where they are best cultivated, we
find two methods; first, keeping up clean cultivation and adding a
little lime every year and, second, add lime without the cultivation.
One great feature of the treatment of the tree in France, where the best
walnuts come from, is the addition of a little lime every year, even if
it's a limestone ground, and that may possibly account for the delicate
character of the French walnuts and the reason why they have the first
call in the market. I don't know that that is true, but it seems to me,
at least, a collateral fact, and collateral facts often mean something.
Mr. Pomeroy: Judging from my own experience I think that that orchard
would be producing now two or two and a half bushels per tree each year
if put under cultivation and given the care of an ordinary peach
orchard.
Mr. Reed: These are seedling trees, you understand, in that orchard we
showed. This is a Persian walnut tree in Mr. Rush's front yard. I've
forgotten the variety.
Mr. Rush: That is the Kaghazi.
Mr. Reed: Now we come to the original hickories. This is one of the
earliest hickory nuts propagated, in fact, it's about the only one so
far. That tree is owned by Mr. Henry Hales of Ridgewood, N. J.
Prof. Smith: Have they fertilized it?
Mr. Reed: No, not especially. It stands on good, fertile soil but I
think no attention has ever been paid to it in the way of cultivation.
Prof. Smith: Have you its yielding record?
Mr. Reed: It never made large records; as I recall it now, it has never
borne more than a few bushels at any one time, perhaps two bushels.
The Chairman: One reason is because it has been cut back regularly every
year for scions?
Mr. Reed: Yes, that's true.
Prof. Smith: Over two hundred years old, then?
The Chairman: I doubt if that tree is over fifty or sixty.
Mr. Reed: That's what I should say,--somewhere in the neighborhood of
fifty or sixty years old.
Mr. Reed: That slide shows a typical grafted tree in Mr. Hales' garden.
It's a nice shapely, thrifty tree about seven years old and only
recently came into bearing to any extent. The nurserymen have had great
difficulty in propagating it until recently. Now that Mr. Jones has come
up from the South and he and Mr. Rush are getting down together
earnestly in the propagation of these northern trees, we will probably
have more of them, but in all the years that Mr. Hales has been working
with that particular variety, he has never been able to get more than a
few trees grown in the nursery, so it is not disseminated to any extent.
The Chairman: Do you think that this will be like the pecan and hickory,
that some varieties will bear fifteen years after grafting and other
varieties two years after grafting, for instance, as extremes?
Mr. Reed: Probably so, the same as it is with other fruits.
The Chairman: It seems to me that that is what we may fairly anticipate.
Mr. Corsan: Like Northern Spy apples and other apples.
Mr. Reed: This slide is a little bit out of order. It's a native Persian
walnut tree that stands in this county. It is owned by Mr. Harness. Mr.
Rush has propagated it under the name of Geit. That photograph was taken
in the fall of 1911. Last year it suffered greatly during the extreme
weather, but it came out again and made a very good growth. This is the
original Rush tree that we may be able to see this afternoon. And this
is the original Nebo that we had hoped to be able to see but will
probably not succeed. It is some seven or eight miles from Mr. Rush's
home and we will hardly be able to make it this afternoon. The slide
before us shows some European filberts that were planted by Mr. Hales
and up to the present time they are doing nicely although they have
never fruited especially heavily; but there is no blight.
The Chairman: How many years?
Mr. Reed: I think those are ten to twelve years old. Perhaps you have
seen them.
The Chairman: Yes. There are two features connected with the filbert
that we ought to discuss right here. One is the tendency to its being
destroyed by the blight of our American hazel, which extends to Indiana,
and another is the fact that it blossoms so early that the female
flowers or the male flowers are both apt to be killed by the frost. All
the members of this Association ought to get to work to bring out a
variety which will have the blight-resisting features and the later
blooming of the American hazel.
Mr. Reed: This slide shows a filbert we will probably be able to see
this afternoon. It is in Mr. Rush's door yard and is still pretty young.
I believe it has not borne of any account.
Mr. Rush: It has borne a little.
The Chairman: How old is it?
Mr. Rush: I think it's about five years old. It is a Barcelona.
Mr. Reed: The next slide is taken in the orchard of Mr. Kerr at Denton,
Md. At one time he had a very nice orchard of these filberts, but the
blight has gotten in and has about wiped out everything. In a letter
from him this fall he said he had very few nuts of any variety, although
he did have a few. A letter that came this week from J. W. Killen, of
Felton, Md., said he had found filberts to be about as unprofitable a
nut, as any he could have grown.
We will spend a few minutes now running over the pecan situation. We can
hardly omit it altogether because there are so many people in the
northern states who are interested in the pecan in a financial way. The
chart before us shows first the native area. This part here is the
portion of the United States in which the pecan is a native. You notice
how far upward it extends, almost to Terre Haute, Indiana, and across
southern Indiana along the Ohio River, and it is right in here, about
where the pencil indicates that some of our best northern varieties have
originated. Mr. Littlepage and W. C. Reed and others have shown us nuts
over in the Court House that originated there. The Busseron and the
Indiana are the two most northern. They are a little way north of
Vincennes. No varieties so far of any merit have originated in Illinois.
While we have the map of Illinois before us, I would like to point out
the place where Mr. Riehl originated the variety of chestnut we referred
to some time ago. Down in more southern Illinois is where we find Mr.
Endicott. This darkened area along the southeastern part of the United
States, and extending away up into Virginia, shows the area to which the
pecan has been planted with more or less success. This area extending
down over the Piedmont and up into Virginia and West Virginia, is the
mountain area to which the pecan is not adapted. You never find pecans
on the uplands. This thick, heavy area shows the territory within which
the pecan has been most extensively planted. It is not common down in
southern Florida. You notice, too, that over here in Texas there have
been very few orchards planted to pecans. North of these shaded areas,
anywhere up in Ohio or Pennsylvania or New York, the pecan has not shown
any adaptability or has not shown sufficient adaptability to justify
commercial planting. Whatever planting of pecans is done in the area
north of the shaded portions there must be considered as experimental.
The Chairman: The southern part of Texas is actually in the tropical
zone. It would be interesting to know if we have the pecan actually
growing in the tropics.
Mr. Reed: We have more or less vague reports that it is growing down
near Brownsville. I think Mr. Littlepage told us the other day of a
friend of his who is planting pecans.
The Chairman: Brownsville is very close to the tropics.
Mr. Littlepage: Mr. Yoacum told me he had a grove down there that had
not been a success so far. I know that quite a number of people have
discussed the question of planting pecans in that section.
Mr. Reed: This is one of the largest of pecan trees; it is the largest
that it has ever been my personal privilege to see. It has a
circumference of between 18 and 19 feet and a spread of about 125 feet.
We estimated that it was about the same height. It stands on the west
side of the Mississippi River, some distance south of Baton Rouge.
Mr. Littlepage: What is the approximate water level below the ground?
Mr. Reed: It is quite near the surface.
Mr. Littlepage: I thought so. There are conditions you will observe that
are unusual. In lands where the water level is near the surface, there
is a tendency in the tree to shove out a lot of surface roots. You can
travel all over the pecan belt of Indiana and will never see a pecan
tree that does not look as if it had been driven in the ground with a
pile-driver, but I have noticed that you find those spreading roots
where the water level is near the surface of the ground.
Mr. Reed: It is interesting to know that right near this tree were other
large trees, nearly as large, that were blown over, and they showed no
tap-roots, but merely the surface roots, This slide shows a pecan bloom.
The pistillate bloom is clear up on the terminate growth; the staminate,
like other nut trees, is on the growth of last season and comes out
somewhat in advance of the pistillate, necessarily.
We come now to the wild pecans of Texas. The recent census figures show
that fully three-fifths of all the pecans produced in the United States
come from Texas. This photograph shows the native wild pecans along the
Colorado River. Here is the pecan as a park tree. This picture was taken
in Llana Park, New Braunfels, in west Texas. One of the nuisances in
pecan trees is illustrated in the upper part of this photograph; you
will notice the Spanish moss that grows so densely on the pecan trees if
neglected. Unless the moss is kept out it gets so dense that it smothers
the fruiting and leafing surface, so trees that are densely covered with
that are able to make leaves only on the terminals. You notice in the
rear the leaves of bananas that grow there throughout the entire year.
The Chairman: I have noticed that the mistletoe was a bad parasite on
the pecans in some regions. Have you found that?
Mr. Reed: Yes, that is true; that is one of the pests of the pecan. This
slide shows a typical Texas scene. The wild pecans have been gathered
and are brought into town and are waiting the buyers. You will notice
right here is a bag that has been stood up and opened, waiting for a
buyer, the same as we see grain in the streets of northern towns, and
here are pecans on their way from the warehouse to the car. The next
slide shows another step; they are on their way now from Texas to the
crackery or the wholesalers. The crop of pecans in Texas alone usually
runs from 200 cars to 600 or 700 cars. This year the crop is small and
probably not over 200 cars, so the prices are going up. This is the
pecan crackery in San Antonio, having a capacity of 20,000 pounds a day.
The pecans are cracked by machinery and the kernels are picked out by
hand. This slide shows a native pecan tree. The one in the foreground
was from across the river near Vincennes. It is one of the first
northern varieties that was introduced, but it is now superseded. The
next is the original tree of the Busseron. The nuts from that tree are
on exhibition over at the Court House brought here by Mr. Reed. The tree
was cut back quite severely several years ago to get budwood and has not
made sufficient top yet to bear normal crops again. This is the original
tree of Indiana. Beside the tree is the introducer, Mr. Mason J.
Niblack, the gentleman with his hand by the tree. Now we come to the
original Green River, one of the northern Kentucky pecans. It is in a
forest more than twelve miles from Evansville across the Ohio River in
Kentucky. The trunk of that tree is typical of others in the forest.
There is a pecan forest of perhaps 200 acres, from which everything but
pecan timber was removed several years ago.
The slide before us shows the trunk of a supposed chance hybrid between
hickory and pecan. The next slide shows a grafted tree of that variety.
It is interesting to note the vigor of this hybrid. It is quite the
usual thing to get added vigor with hybrids. This is one of the most
beautiful, dense, dark green trees that I have ever seen in the hickory
family. This tree is in northern Georgia, but it is not so prolific as
the parent tree.
The Chairman: Does the shell fill down there?
Mr. Reed: No, it does not.
The Chairman: It grows very vigorously in Connecticut. It is a perfectly
hardy hybrid, but I am afraid I shall only be able to use the crop for
spectacle cases.
Mr. Reed: This shows one of the most common methods of propagating the
pecan, the annular system. It is a slight modification of the system Mr.
Rush applies to the propagation of the walnut. This shows one of the
tools designed especially for annular budding, the Galbraith knife. The
rest of the operation you already understand. It is merely placing the
bud in position and wrapping the same as Mr. Rush does.
The Chairman: I would like to ask, does it make a great deal of
difference whether the bud ring is half an inch long or an inch and a
quarter long?
Mr. Rush: It does not make any difference. The union takes place on the
cambium layer. It is not made on the cut.
The Chairman: Then the length of the bud is not of great importance?
Mr. Rush: No, it is of no importance at all.
Mr. Reed: This slide may be a little bit misleading. Two nuts matured in
the nursery on a scion that was inserted in February. The scion was
taken from a mature tree and the fruit buds had already set and had
enough nourishment to carry them through the season so that they
matured. That is no indication of what may be expected in the way of
bearing. It is one of the freaks. This is merely a view of a
fourteen-year old pecan orchard in south-western Georgia, a 700-acre
orchard owned largely by one person. That is the orchard belonging to
Mr. G. M. Bacon, a name probably familiar to some of you. Those trees
are set 46 feet, 8 inches apart, each way. There are twenty trees to the
acre, just beginning to bear now. That photograph was taken some two
years ago showing the first step in topworking. The top has been
removed, as you notice, and the next slide shows the subsequent
water-sprouts which are later budded. The lower branches were left in
the first place to take up the sap while the new head was in formation.
They have now been removed. Our next point might be brought out in
connection with this slide. One of the typical, sub-tropical storms, not
unusual in the Gulf States, swept over this area in September, just as
the nuts were beginning to mature and defoliated the trees and whipped
off the nuts. The sap was still in circulation, and the varieties that
respond most readily to warm weather, that start earliest in the spring,
sent out new leaves, so that foliage was foliage that ought to have come
on the next year, that is, it was exhausting next year's buds. The same
year the tree sent out its blossom buds, so it had no fruit the
following season. This slide shows one of the pests in the pecan
orchard, the twig girdler, at work. The insect deposits its egg under
the bark up at about that point, then goes down below girdles the twig,
and it breaks off, goes to the ground, and the insect comes out, goes
into the ground and comes out the next season. There are a good many
drawbacks that are occurring and more are to be expected the same as
with other fruit. There are probably no more setbacks to pecan growing
than there are to the growing of other fruit, but this is one of the
things. This orchard was set in land bordering the Flint River and at
the time this picture was taken the water stood at the depth of three
feet. It probably did no harm, because it didn't stay more than a week
or ten days. Sometimes it stays longer and in such cases it is a serious
matter. In Texas, floods come up like that into the branches of the
trees, so high in some seasons after the nuts are formed, that the nuts
deteriorate and fall to the ground. In such cases it is a pretty serious
thing. (Applause.)
The time for which the "scenic" was engaged having expired, the
delegates returned to the Court House and the regular program was
resumed.
The Chairman: We will next hear from Mr. Lake.
Mr. Lake: My topic, aside from the slides, was concerning the result of
the work at Arlington this year. It is all written out but I don't
propose to read the paper at this stage. I have not been a teacher and
lecturer for 25 years for nothing, and I don't propose to kill the few
friends I have among nut growers by talking them to death when they are
hungry and want to see something interesting. I will send this paper in
due time to the secretary, and give way now to Mr. Jones. I did want to
show you on the slides a few illustrations of cross fertilization
between the Japanese and the American walnut, but we will put those in
engravings and put them in the Northern Nut Growers' Journal, so that
you will see them there with better satisfaction. Now one or two words
about these Persian walnuts. These are eastern grown seedlings, the best
that I have been able to pick out. Here is an Oregon grown nut. That is
the ideal type for dessert walnuts. This is the Meylan. There is only
one better, and that is the real Mayette, of which we grow very few in
the United States, but we are growing considerable of the Meylan.
Whether we can grow this successfully here or not, I am not certain, but
it is well worth trying. The better type of our nut seedlings in the
east are from the Parisienne. We must get a nut something like this that
you can crack between your fingers, not one that is sealed so hard that
it requires a hammer, and must get one with a very good quality of meat.
One great advantage to the walnut grower in the East will be that he can
get his crop on to the Thanksgiving market, which is the cream of the
market--something the Western or European nut grower cannot do. So if we
can grow a nut reasonably fair in quality we can expect excellent
results.
The Chairman: Mr. Jones, will you give us your points now?
Mr. Jones: Dr. Deming yesterday asked me to give a little demonstration
of grafting and I have brought along a sort of transplanted nursery on a
board, so that I might do so.
(Here Mr. Jones demonstrated methods of grafting the pecan.)
The Chairman: Tell us about the wax cloth, Mr. Jones.
Mr. Jones: We use that over the cut.
The Chairman: How do you make your wax cloth?
Mr. Jones: We take a roll of this, possibly three or four yards long,
very thin muslin, roll it up and drop it in the melted wax.
The Chairman: How do you make that wax?
Mr. Jones: We don't measure the ingredients, but I think it varies from
four to six pound of rosin, to one pound of beeswax and a tea cup full
of boiled linseed oil and about a tablespoon of lamp black.
Prof. Smith: What do you use the lamp black for, Mr. Jones?
Mr. Jones: To toughen the wax so that it will not crack and so that it
will adhere better.
A Member: How do you get your excess of wax off the cloth?
Mr. Jones: We just throw the rolls on a board and press them.
Mr. Reed: I believe you would find it easier to tear it up into strips
than to put it in rolls. We have been using that method. We ran short of
cloth and I went to town and got some and tore off a piece about 8 or 9
yards long and folded it up into strips that wide and dipped it in the
pure beeswax and pressed it on a board and it was ready for work.