MONDAY AFTERNOON SESSION
PRESIDENT BEST: In the morning session Mr. Allaman proposed that we hold our next convention in Lancaster, Pa. Is there a motion to that effect?
MR. RICK: I move that our next meeting, 1954, be held in Lancaster County, Pennsylvania. That is supposed to be one of the garden counties in the country. It has stood first and second in production. I don't know what it stands now, but it wouldn't be far from the top. It would be most interesting to all our members, I am sure, to pay Lancaster County a visit. Motion seconded by Mr. Ellis and passed.
PRESIDENT BEST: According to the by-laws, we get a report of the Nominating Committee at this time. We have our election at the last business session.
MR. SLATE: The Nominating Committee, consisting of Max Hardy as chairman
and some others, including myself, presents the following candidates:
For President, R. B. Best. For vice-president, Gilbert Becker; for
Treasurer, W. S. Clark; and for Secretary Spencer Chase.
PRESIDENT BEST: Are there other nominations? (No response.) You will have a chance for further nominations at our last business session.
PRESIDENT BEST: Now, then, we have an opportunity to hear from a group of what we might call authorities in their various fields. We have quite an assortment. The only way I know of to express it is to say we have the wise men out of the east and the wild men out of the west. I think we first might hear from Mr. Kyhl of Sabula, Iowa. Mr. Kyhl, you come up and give us your version of the nut business.
About Nuts
IRA M. KYHL, Sabula, Iowa
What we all have in mind at this time is nuts and more nuts. One way to get them is to plant more nut trees. Why not start a campaign in this direction? Where I live in the midwest the black walnut is at home and likewise the hickory, hazel, etc. Farmers may be reluctant to set aside acreage for this purpose but they could be planted along fence rows around the entire farm and would produce shade for livestock, an abundance of marketable nuts, and later a fortune in saw logs. The average size farm of 160 acres could support a great many black walnuts if planted along fence rows which ordinarily grow up to brush and weeds. Seedlings are cheap or one could buy 2 or 3 bushels of Thomas nuts and raise their own. One could also plant hickories, heartnuts, filberts and chestnuts if variety is desired along fence rows, but the main thing is to get this work started. We could no doubt get cooperation from County Agents and Conservation Departments because of wind breaks and erosion control. Farmers who could be induced to do this work would no doubt become nut enthusiasts in due time.
I feel that at this time it may be in line to pay a slight tribute to our friend the squirrel. I wonder how many of us gave a thought as to who was responsible for all of our wild trees, such as black walnuts, butternuts, hickories, hazels and so forth, and how they came about. The answer is simple, the squirrels, of course. They have been planting nuts for centuries and without their good work in the past, there would be very few wild nut trees.
The squirrel has been wrongfully condemned for his apparently good work and has even been cussed a little for living on the efforts of his own labor, and due to my appreciation of his good work, I have grafted or rather topworked some of the trees he planted to Persian walnuts, pecans, etc., so that he may have more of a variety of nuts. Someday I expect to have some of the largest and fattest squirrels in America. I cover some of the choice varieties with stove pipe. They seem to take the hint and don't bother the nuts. One more thing, there does not seem to be enough nuts to go around, that is, enough for both the squirrels and ourselves. So let's plant more trees so that the squirrels can't possibly eat them all and when we have done that, then let's plant a lot more.
We now have many species of nuts and many varieties of each species, many of which have proven hardy in cold climates. It is very encouraging to note the good work that is being done to produce better and more varieties. One very fine nut that doesn't seem to have had much work done on it is the hard shell almond. It does very well for me, is self-pollinating, bears very heavily, and can be grafted on peach stocks with good results. I have also had very good success with Persian walnuts, heartnuts, filberts, chestnuts, hickories, pecans, hazels and black walnuts.
Natural Variation Observed in Shagbark Hickory, Carya ovata (Mill.) K.
Koch. in Central New York
DAVID H. CALDWELL, N. Y. State College of Forestry, Syracuse, N. Y.
The shagbark hickory has been extremely important in the economy of the United States during its period of early development. The handles of the axes which leveled extensive forested areas in Colonial days were frequently made from sturdy hickory wood. The nuts furnished food for man in the form of oil or nutmeats and often hogs were fattened on hickory nuts, beechnuts and chestnuts. As settlement progressed, the demand on hickory as wood for wagon parts increased while the use of the thick-shelled nuts for food decreased except by the country boy or girl who wandered from tree to tree in the fall collecting nuts for cracking by the fireside in the wintertime.
The author remembers bounding out of bed as a child in the fall before dawn on the nights when there had been a frost or a heavy wind, in an effort to beat the squirrels in the race to obtain the rich harvest of hickory nuts to be found lying beneath the fine old trees near Herkimer, N. Y. By some coincidence, both the boys and the squirrels knew of the same trees which were most sought after for their crops of nuts. It was at this time that the variability of hickory nuts was first observed. Thus it was that the nuts of certain trees were never gathered, while the grass beneath other favorite trees was gleaned carefully for all fallen nuts.
The present investigation of the shagbark began in the fall of 1949 and continued through the summer of 1953. It was initiated with the previous knowledge of the extreme variability to be observed between the nuts of individual shagbark hickory trees and was conducted for the purpose of determining whether or not that variability was also expressed through other features of the tree such as buds, leaves, bark or form. Consequently, a systematic study was begun of individual trees totaling 158 found mostly in Onondaga County, New York plus the edges of surrounding counties. The trees were observed throughout the growing season so that the various tree parts could be observed for comparison. It was a preconceived idea by the author that there might be several or more distinct subdivisions into which individuals of shagbark might be placed through the use of macroscopic characters.
Observations were made over a period of three growing seasons on the following characters of each tree:
(1) bark (2) buds and twigs (3) leaves (4) flowers (5) fruit
Each character was observed more than once for each tree as a check on possible yearly variation for specific characteristics in the trees from which data was collected.
The generalized description for shagbark hickory is as follows:
SIZE—a tree ranging at maturity from 50 to 100+ feet in height, generally 2 to 3 feet in diameter and very occasionally reaching 4 feet in diameter.
BARK—usually under 3/4 of an inch in thickness, occasionally up to 1 inch thick with a characteristic light or smoky-gray color when dry and breaking up into long plates or strips loosely attached to the trunk near the middle of the plate.
BUDS—terminal buds usually 3/8 to 3/4 of an inch long, subglobose to narrowly ovate, with 8-10 imbricate scales, the outermost of which are a blackish brown with dark brown tomentum, and a short mucronate or attenuate apex, inner scales light brown with longer lanate pubescence and apex acute to obtuse; lateral buds smaller, about 1/4 of an inch with tightly appressed scales.
TWIGS—angled or rounded, reddish brown to yellowish brown, or gray, turning more or less gray with age; pubescent the first year.
LEAVES—compound—ranging from 3-7 ovate to oblong lanceolate leaflets, usually 5, terminal leaflet as large or larger than the first two laterals, usually 4-8" long, generally glabrous on both surfaces but with a finely serrate, ciliate margin; total leaf size ranging from 8-15" for mature leaves.
FLOWERS—(a) female—occurring in 2 to several flowered spikes, with a one-celled ovary, about 1/4 to 1/3 inch long covered with tomentum; flowers rusty to yellowish green in color; stigma with two stigmatic lobes; bracts much longer than the lateral bractlets. (b) male—in three parted or branched aments, each flower usually containing 4 stamens with a 2 or a 3 lobed calyx; aments 3-4" long with glandular hairs.
FRUIT—oval, globose or pear shaped, consisting of a woody husk 1/4 to 1/2" thick breaking usually along 4 lines of suture exposing a flattened nut generally 4 ridged, smooth or slightly roughened; usually white or cream in color, seed sweet with 2 cotyledons.