Northern Nut Growers Association Report of the Proceedings at the 13th Annual Meeting / Rochester, N.Y. September, 7, 8 and 9, 1922

by Unknown

PROCEEDINGS OF THE TREE PLANTING CEREMONIES AT HIGHLAND PARK, ROCHESTER, N. Y.

September 9th, 1922, 11 A. M.

PRESIDENT MCGLENNON: This occasion represents the custom of the association of planting a nut tree in one of the parks of the community, in which the annual convention is held. We had expected to have some black walnut seedlings grown from nuts presented to ex-President Linton by the superintendent at Mount Vernon, Washington's old home. I am not sure but I have quite a vivid remembrance that the trees from which these nuts were gathered were fruiting in Washington's time. However it would be a very delightful time if we could have such trees to plant in memory of that great character. But I am sorry to say that we have been disappointed in not receiving the trees from Mr. Linton. He expressed them from Saginaw the day before yesterday and we have made diligent effort to locate them in this city this morning but have been unable to get any trace of them. Anticipating such a happening Mrs. Ellwanger, who had on exhibition at the convention some Persian walnuts grown in pots, at our request very kindly consented to let us use one of those trees. If we had had a little more time to consider it undoubtedly Mr. Dunbar would have arranged to have this tree planted on the land that was given to the city by George Ellwanger, Mrs. Ellwanger's father-in-law, and Patrick Barry of the world famed nursery of Ellwanger & Barry. We are going to plant one of these Persian walnut trees here (the planting is now going on) and there is a greater likelihood that this tree will live than the black walnut, as that tree had to be dug and transported. We feel reasonably sure that this tree will live to commemorate our meeting in Rochester this year.

We are also going to plant an Arkansas hickory, that Mr. Dunbar has had dug from the park nursery, a short distance from where the walnut is planted. I think this, too, is an appropriate tree to plant because of the success of the hickory in this community. Mr. Dunbar tells me that practically all of the varieties of hickory of North America are planted on this park slope. We took great pleasure in driving through here the other day and listening to an explanation of their history by Mr. Dunbar.

We are honored today by the presence of the Dean of the New York State School of Forestry, Dean Mann, who has consented to address us. It gives me great pleasure to introduce to you Dean Mann.

DEAN MANN: President McGlennon, ladies and gentlemen:

I assure you it gives me great pleasure to be here because as a forester and tree lover by profession I am also a tree lover by nature. I can conceive of no more worthy, more beautiful nor attractive memorial than a tree dedicated to the Father of our Country, something which will grow in size, in beauty and in productivity as the years roll by. As foresters would remind you, ladies and gentlemen, the Father of our Country served his apprenticeship long before he became a land owner and patriarch on those broad Virginia acres. The Father of our Country started out in life as a forester and surveyor. You may remember that he piloted, or was to be one of the pilots of Braddock's expedition, having gained his knowledge of the woods through his early life as a young surveyor in the forests of Virginia.

There are in New York state approximately fourteen million acres better suited to tree crop production than to field crop production. Here in the northeastern corner of the United States, where our great centers of population are found, we have in the state of Maine seventy per cent suited to tree crop production but unsuited to tillage; we have similar conditions in Massachusetts and Connecticut. Throughout this northeastern section of the country we have a tree soil domain which will grow trees and which can't be plowed with profit. All who are interested in the production of trees for whatever purpose should realize that this nation cannot permanently prosper unless every acre of its land is put to its best permanent use.

I think that you will agree with me that it requires no prophetic eye to see the day not far distant when we will have, stretching from the Island of Manhattan up to where Albany now stands, one vast series of teeming cities with suburb touching suburb. The problem then will be how to feed this multitude. Developments in Russia show that, no matter how idealistic one's theory of government may be, food, in the last analysis, is the thing which makes or breaks a nation.

Those of you who have studied some of the interpreters of early Scripture will remember, perhaps, that the Garden of Eden was in reality an oasis of trees in the great valley of Mesopotamia, and even today "garden" in the oriental term means a group of trees. It has been proven by experience in these different tropical realms that where tree production is biggest and nuts and other products are grown under intensive cultivation, an acre will produce more food than where grazing is practiced. I spent a very pleasant year in California and saw some of the operations of the California nut growers, where they are growing English walnuts on a most extensive scale. I believe I will be making no false statement when I say that those areas in southern California which are growing nuts produce more in fats, proteins and calories for the maintenance of the health and strength of the human race than do the acres which are given up to the growing of animal crops.

So I applaud the idea of planting a tree in the memory of the Father of his Country. I believe I belong to your group, at least through interest, because I have been doing a little experimenting of my own in my back yard at Syracuse where I have an English walnut which I planted in 1915 which is this year producing for the first time. I am going to take those nuts and see what can be done with them in perpetuating that particular variety, because it is hardy, fast growing, and early to mature.

The New York State College of Forestry has a platform as broad as the entire state. We are interested in every kind of land which is not suited to agriculture, fish, game, recreation, conservation of water, and I pledge to you the sympathy and the support of the New York State College of Forestry. We have three experiment stations; one in Oneida county, one in Onandaga county, and another in Cattaraugus, with a fourth in St. Lawrence, if you wish to call it such. We would be delighted to receive from you any slip or any sort of fruit which you wish us to try out at these experiment stations. I believe that the time will come when some combined system of forestry and horticulture can be maintained which will aim at the production of food stuffs from trees, with lumber, perhaps, as a by-product. That works out in the old country and the day is not far off when it can be practiced here.

I congratulate the members of this association on having completed what was, from all accounts, a most successful meeting. I regret that I couldn't have been here earlier and met the other members of your body. I congratulate you; I wish you God speed, and I again tender the support of the College of Forestry.

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PRESIDENT MCGLENNON: We certainly have received great encouragement from Dean Mann's remarks, which to me, and I believe to all present, were most interesting and instructive.

I want to hear just a few words from our esteemed friend, Mr. John
Dunbar, Assistant Superintendent of Parks.

MR. DUNBAR: I think it is a very happy and fortunate circumstance that Mr. Mann is here this morning representing the College of Forestry of Syracuse. Every word that Mr. Mann has said is absolutely true. The forestry question of this country is indeed a very serious question. Every man, and every woman, should give most serious thought to it, and I hope the words Dean Mann has spoken to us here this morning will go in to all our hearts very deeply.

Of course the Park Department is studying trees from the ornamental and arboricultural point of view. We think, however, that arboriculture, horticulture and forestry, as the Dean said, are very, very closely allied and should surely work together. I think his idea is a very excellent one; that there should be a very close connection or union between forestry, horticulture, nut culture, and all kinds of fruit culture. I hope that day is not far distant.

PRESIDENT MCGLENNON: Ladies and gentlemen, the treasurer of our association is a man who is intensely interested in nut culture. He has done wonderful things for its advancement and especially for the advancement of the interests of the Northern Nut Growers Association.

MR. BIXBY: While Dean Mann was speaking the thought came to me, how could we better co-operate with the Department of Forestry? I think the work of the Nut Growers Association, which is particularly interested in the use of nut trees for orchards, and that of the Department of Forestry, which looks upon them particularly as producers of timber, could be very closely allied. The thought came to me, could not we right here work out some practical suggestion whereby we two could co-operate? I would like to ask Dean Mann what nut trees they are planting for forest purposes.

DEAN MANN: We have done very little. We have, at our experiment station at Chittenango, done some work with the English walnuts. This particularly hardy specimen that I have in my own back yard—I have two, one of them is growing very slowly—are from our experiment station. We have really had so much to do in the way of popular education in New York State in the timber products, that we are merely, as they say in the South, fixing to begin with other things. That is the only species with which we have made an actual start. There is this however: what can foresters, horticulturists and nut enthusiasts do to supply the place of the American chestnut? I really came here as a seeker after truth on this particular phase. You men probably know more about it than I. What can we produce? Is there any hybrid which can be introduced into this country which will take the place of the American chestnut?

MR. BIXBY: In reply to that I would say that I have hundreds of seedlings of the Chinese chestnut on which the blight has been working for years and has not destroyed them. I would be very glad to send them to the College of Forestry and let you try them.

DEAN MANN: They will be planted with extreme care and a barbed wire put around them.

MR. BIXBY: There is another thing, the rough shell Japanese walnut, so-called, which is really a butternut hybrid. I have planted it and it is growing at a tremendous rate, even faster than the Japanese walnut. I expect to get a lot of those nuts this year and I wondered how the College of Forestry would like to try some of them.

DEAN MANN: I would be delighted.

MR. BIXBY: Then there is one other nut the big shell bark hickory which is a native of the Mississippi Valley, which has been planted in Pennsylvania and up in Lockport, New York. It grows finely, it bears early, and I think that it might be worth trying.

DEAN MANN: We have adopted this platform: "Anything which will interest the people of New York State." We must, as a state institution, limit our horizon very largely to the state of New York. We do slip over occasionally, but anything which will interest the people of New York State in trees of any kind, for any purpose, is a step towards forest conservation. Take your city dweller in New York City, get him interested in a shade tree in front of his apartment house, or in a group of shade trees in the adjoining park, and you have converted that man along the line of King Forest. So we will be very glad to take any seeds you have and give them excellent care.