AN APPEAL TO OWNERS OF HARDY NUT TREES
C. A. Reed, Nut Culturist, U. S. Department of
Agriculture, Washington, D. C.
Ever since the colonists first established themselves in the Western Hemisphere, nut trees have been planted up and down the Atlantic Coast. One of the species oftenest included in such planting was a walnut, a native to Persia which, with Romanism, had spread across Europe and the channel into England. In the Old World it had variously been known as Jove's nut, under the supposition that it had once been the food of the gods; Royal nut, meaning King nut; and by other common names which would be interesting to discuss but which are not pertinent in this connection. In England it had been known merely as the "walnut," but in the New World, in order to distinguish it from the walnut found here, it was called the "English" walnut. In the trade today it is commonly known by the Old World name, other walnuts being distinguished from it by prefixing their common names, as Eastern, California, Mexican or Japanese black walnut, etc. However, being a native of Persia, it was long ago decided that the correct name of this nut should be "Persian" walnut, and not "English" walnut. As such it has now been referred to in scientific publications for well towards a quarter of a century.
Subsequent to this rather limited and scattered planting on the Atlantic Coast, by perhaps three hundred years, the Persian walnut put in its appearance on the Pacific Coast. According to Bulletin No. 231 by the University of California, it is probable that occasional trees were planted in that state long before the discovery of gold in 1848. Following that date, planting became much more general, but usually with hardshell strains and always with seedling trees. From these early trees the crops were never of great importance. In 1867 Mr. Joseph Sexton of Santa Barbara, planted a sack of walnuts bought in the markets of San Francisco, which he had reason to believe had been grown in Chili. Of the resulting trees some were very good, others mediocre, and some worthless. Later on, nuts from the best of these trees were planted, and second generation seedlings produced. In this way the famous Santa Barbara Papershell type of walnut was evolved. With it developed an industry which among the tree products of southern California is now second only to that of the orange. In 1910, the census takers found that in the year preceding, the crop of walnuts of southern California, which, by the way, came almost entirely from four counties, was valued at more than that of the total crop of all other nuts grown in the United States put together.
Four years after Mr. Sexton of southern California had planted this sack of walnuts from San Francisco, Mr. Felix Gillet of Nevada City, in northern California, began the introduction of French walnuts both by seed and scions. Out of his efforts and those of others who subsequently joined him, developed the walnut industry of northern California, which now bids fair some day to equal that of the lower part of the state. The famous French varieties of Franquette and Mayette were introduced by Mr. Gillet, and from seedlings of his growing evolved the Concord, the San Jose, and no doubt the Chase varieties.[1]
A nut which probably has received equally as much, if not more, attention at the hands of experimental planters in this part of the country is the chestnut. Just when the introduction of foreign strains began, history seems to have failed to make clear; but according to Powell[2] general dissemination in the Delaware section began with introductions by Eleuthers Irénée du Pont de Nemours, made at about 1803. It is said that some of the original trees planted at that time near the present site of the du Pont Powder mills by Mr. du Pont, still survived when Mr. Powell recorded their history in 1898.
The spread of both European and Japanese chestnuts and their general trial throughout the Eastern States has been narrated at former meetings of this association. The chestnut blight, discovered on Long Island in 1904, after it had apparently gained several years' headway, and which now seems fairly certain to have been introduced from Japan, has so monopolized the attention of orchardists, foresters, landscape gardeners and others interested in the chestnut that for the time being little is being done with it, other than to study and discuss this disease. What the final outcome will be no one can predict, but it is not improbable that our pathologists will discover some practical means of control, or that a natural enemy to the blight will appear. Nor is it unlikely that immune strains of chestnuts, either native or foreign, will replace our present groves and orchards, in case other efforts fail.
Another nut which has received a large degree of attention at the hands of the planters and upon which hopes have been built from time to time is the hazel, or filbert. Here again, history seems to have failed us, for as yet the writer has been able to learn but little regarding the early introductions into this country. In his Nut Culturist, published in 1896, Mr. Fuller (A. S.) reasoned that at that time plants of the European hazels must have been grown in the gardens of this country for at least a hundred years. Writers on pomology make little reference to this nut, but according to Mr. Fuller, nurserymen's catalogs listed hazel varieties all through the early part of the last century. It was believed that the hazel promised much for the gardener and the general planter who wished for early returns. The species seemed capable of readily adapting itself to cultivation, and being a shrub rather than a tree, it required little space. It could be cultivated along with other garden products at little additional expense for labor. Being an early bearer it doubtless appealed strongly to the normal American demand for quick returns.
Nevertheless, this nut met with its mortal foe in the way of a native fungus which in a great many sections has proved entirely too much for the European species. Where once this species was well represented up and down the Atlantic Coast, few of its representatives are now to be found.
Some early attention in these Eastern States has been paid to the almond, another foreign species. It is supposed that this nut is a native of the Mediterranean basin. Just when it was first tried on the Atlantic Coast is not known, but of the nuts thus far mentioned it has proved to be the least promising for the Eastern section. Sometimes said to be "as hardy as the peach," it has been found to be the most exacting in its requirements of soil and climate of any important nut now grown in this country. Except with certain of the hardshell varieties, no almonds are now known to be in any sense successful east of the Rocky Mountains. According to Wickson (E. J.) in his California Fruits, the almond is known to have been introduced into California previous to 1853. At that time efforts to build up an almond industry on the Pacific Coast began to assume a somewhat serious air. After a half century of trials and more or less persistent effort by the California planters the culture of this nut has developed into the third most important nut industry in the United States. As for the time being, the growing of Persian walnuts centered in southern California, so did the growing of almonds in the Sacramento Valley of northern California.
During the whole of this period of early American nut growing history, little attention in any part of the country was paid to the native nuts. However, in the southeastern part of the United States there existed a large portion of the country to which no choice species of nut trees were either indigenous or had been introduced. Necessity, curious interest, and, more probably intelligent purpose, prompted sea captains, plying from West to East Gulf Coast ports, Easterners returning home from visits in the West, Westerners visiting in the East, and no doubt nomadic bands of Indians, to carry pecans from the Mississippi River and beyond, to the coast of Mississippi, to Alabama and the South Atlantic States, where they were planted as seed. For fully a century the species gradually spread over the plains sections of the eastern Gulf and South Atlantic States. In 1846, according to Taylor (William A.) in the Yearbook (Department of Agriculture) of 1904, a Louisiana slave succeeded in grafting a number of pecan trees. So far as can now be learned, really intelligent interest in pecan culture began with that date, although history records no further successful propagation of the species until about 1882 when William Nelson began to propagate this variety in his nursery near New Orleans. Soon afterwards, C. E. Pabst of Ocean Springs, Miss., and E. E. Risien of San Saba, Texas, joined in the pioneer work. The late Col. W. R. Stuart of Ocean Springs soon took part by giving publicity to the early varieties. Gradually, but steadily, choice varieties developed, were propagated and were disseminated. Orchard planting followed, but did not assume great importance until since about 1905. The orchards, therefore, were still too young at the time the last census was taken to have been in bearing to any extent. However, the crop of pecans from the native forests and from single trees left standing in the open space where the forests had been cleared is shown by the census reports to have been the second most valuable of American nut crops in 1909.
In quantity, the production of cultivated pecans is still slight in comparison with that of the wild product or with cultivated walnuts and almonds of the Pacific Coast. Just now, however, a great many of the orchards, planted this century, are beginning to bear and not improbably the production of cultivated pecans will soon eclipse that of the forest product, and before long will overhaul the lead now held by the Persian walnut.
Thus, briefly, has been the separate history of the principal nuts of this country. Collectively, the history of American nut culture has been as follows: Nuts from foreign countries which have been under cultivation for centuries have been more inviting than have the native and undeveloped species, and so have received the major portion of attention in America. Then too, human nature has shown itself in the greater interest taken by nut planters in foreign nuts instead of those near at hand. It is in sections remote from their place of origin that many of the leading nuts have attained their greatest degree of perfection. Thus, the average pecan of the Atlantic Coast is distinctly superior to that of the western Gulf; the Persian walnut scarcely known in Persia is best known in France and in southern California.
Progress has been slow and not concerted. Seedling trees have been planted under the firm conviction that they would come true, or because methods of propagation other than by seedage were not understood.
The Persian walnut orchards of California from which today the bulk of the production is being realized, are of seedling trees. However, the Californians have learned their lesson and today are replacing their orchards with budded stock as rapidly as possible. They have found that while the Persian walnut, which for centuries has been grown from seed, will reproduce itself fairly true to type, it does not repeat true to variety. Every tree, no matter how carefully its parentage may have been guarded, is unlike any other. The seedlings differ in traits of vigor, hardiness, susceptibility to disease, time of beginning to bear, productiveness, and longevity, and the nuts vary in size, form, thickness of shell, ease of cracking, and in kernel characteristics.
The people of California have also found that in many ways, Persian walnut trees on their own roots are less desirable than are those budded or grafted on the roots of some black walnut.
The earliest pecan planters likewise set seedling trees, partly because no others were available, but more largely because of a supposition that such seedlings would come true. Later on, planters chose grafted trees of large varieties, irrespective of others' merits or demerits. Today, the orchards of both seedling trees and illy-selected varieties are being topworked at great expense of time, labor, and money.
In the northern and eastern part of the United States, the situation until very recently has been one of practical standstill. Efforts with foreign nuts have resulted in our being but little ahead of the starting point of a couple of centuries ago.
The great majority of the Persian walnut, chestnut, and hazel trees which have been tried have failed us; some have even brought fatal or near-fatal diseases to us.
At first thought, we would feel compelled to abandon all further efforts with the foreign nuts; but not all that have been tried are guilty of offence or failure. Here and there, from New England to Michigan and from Maryland to Missouri, we are finding occasional nut trees either in groups or standing singly, which because of their age, vigor, productiveness, and quantity and quality of nuts, appear to be fit foundation stock for the varieties so much needed in this part of the country. A number of such are being propagated by the nurserymen and, as the members here present know, are being disseminated.
The present great need is for knowledge regarding the location of other such trees, not only of the foreign species, but of the natives as well. The Northern Nut Growers' Association and the Federal Department of Agriculture at Washington together are seeking to find Persian, Japanese, or black walnut, Asiatic, European or American chestnut, European or American hazel, and native butternut, hickory, pecan, chinquapin and beech trees of more than ordinary merit. Upon the locating of, and the propagation from such trees, as new varieties, apparently depends the future of nut growing east of the Mississippi and north of the Ohio and Potomac Rivers.
The appeal therefore is made to the owners of hardy nut trees that they drop a postal to the Department of Agriculture at Washington, D. C., stating that they desire a mailing box and frank for sending in a few specimens of the nuts which they believe to be of more than average merit. The only expense necessary to incur will be in the price of the card, and in the trouble of collecting and packing the nuts. Before mailing, the package should be plainly marked with the name and address of the sender, and a note should be inclosed giving information regarding the location, ownership, bearing habits, etc., of the tree from which the nuts were obtained.
If more convenient, the nuts may be sent to this association, which in any case will be apprised by the Department of all new varieties of apparent merit which may be brought to light.
However, no one should anticipate a great fortune as the result of any nut tree of which he may find himself the owner. It is not possible for a variety to be of especial value, no matter how promising the parent tree may appear to be, until it has established proof of its adaptability and merit in other sections remote from that of its origin. Except in rare cases it has been only after a variety of any kind of fruit has become well known by many who have tested it and spoken for it that it has become popular or in great demand.
Therefore, all there will be "in it" for you, if you chance to be the owner of a nut tree of merit will be the thanks of this Association and posterity and the probability of having the variety named in your honor.
Mr. Littlepage: I should like to drop a word about the American Nut Journal published here at Rochester, N. Y. I would like to ask all the members of the Association to make as much effort as they possibly can to get new subscribers to the Journal. I don't own any stock in it, but I am talking purely in the interests of nut culture. Without a magazine nine tenths of our work would be entirely useless because it would be lost to the public. One of the duties of the members should be the support of the organ which puts forth the information for which this organization stands.
The President: Methods of propagating pecans, hickories and walnuts have been discovered and used, at times, for a century. I know of a man who grafted them twenty years ago in New Jersey, but he left no records of his methods. The Journal helps us to keep these records.
This association has a great variety of contributors. We have with us men who work on the exceedingly practical end of propagation. W. C. Reed is a combination of the student and the propagator.