WHERE MAY THE NORTHERN PECAN BE EXPECTED TO BEAR
Willard G. Bixby, Baldwin, Nassau Co., N. Y.
In the January 1916 issue of the American Nut Journal is an article by Meredith P. Reed read before the Western Association of Nurserymen at their annual meeting in Kansas City, Mo., December 1915 entitled the Pecan Areas of the United States, describing the limits between which the pecan may be grown. In this paper the matter of the Pecan Belts of the country are discussed and their extent determined pretty largely by the length of the season (in average years), that is by the number of days between the latest spring frosts and the earliest fall frosts. A map was shown on which these areas were marked out, and it has been very useful to the writer in answering inquiries from persons who want to know if pecans can be grown in a given section.
Mr. John Garretson, Aspers, Adams Co., Penn., has on his place bearing Stuart and Schley pecans, two of the standard southern varieties. These bear nuts of typical shape but which are only a fraction of the size that these nuts would be if grown in southern Georgia. This clearly shows that some of the standard southern pecans require something which they do not get at Aspers to enable them to properly mature their nuts. The trees stand the cold of winter but the fruit does not properly mature. Mr. Jones has suggested that it is heat that is lacking and has advanced the idea that even though the trees are hardy to winter cold they have not sufficient summer heat at Aspers to enable them to mature their crops. This has brought up the question as to whether there was any method of measuring the summer heat available for causing pecan nuts to grow and mature.
Observations on northern pecans (and some southern ones) on my place at Baldwin caused me to note that no pecans started to vegetate at Baldwin before May. May is the first spring month here when the pecan will leave out. May is also the first spring month when the average monthly temperature here will reach 50°F. It occurred to me that if we note the excess average monthly temperatures over 50° and sum these items for a season we would get what might be termed a figure for "pecan growing heat units." This figure of 50° is doubtless capable of some refinement. There is no reason to suppose that further study may not show that it should be somewhat more or less but it is the best we have so far and seemingly it is proving useful.
If we calculate these figures for Evansville, Ind., for 1914, for example, and show the method of doing it we will have
| Average Monthly | Average Monthly Temp. | |
|---|---|---|
| 1914 | Temperatures | in Excess of 50 deg. |
| January | 39.6 | |
| February | 29.9 | |
| March | 42.0 | |
| April | 55.4 | 5.4 |
| May | 67.9 | 17.9 |
| June | 80.0 | 30.0 |
| July | 82.2 | 32.2 |
| August | 78.0 | 28.0 |
| September 69.6 | 19.6 | |
| October | 60.8 | 10.8 |
| November | 49.2 | |
| December | 31.0 | _____ |
| Total 143.9 |
The pecan growing heat units, pecan units they may be called for short, for Evansville, Ind., in 1914 were 143.9. From this we might conclude that a place where the pecan units for 1914 would figure out 143.9 would be likely (as far as climatic conditions are concerned) to grow pecans as well as Evansville, that is, of course if other years should show similar figures.
With the idea of seeing if the experience of those who were growing pecans would be anything like what might be calculated from the Weather Bureau Records, letters were written to all members of the National Nut Growers' Association to find out if pecans grew and bore well in their sections and if so which varieties. From the replies received it has been in a number of instances difficult to judge just how well pecans grow in some sections. For this reason I have interpreted the replies somewhat on the basis of my own knowledge and on certain facts told me by Mr. C. A. Reed. Apparently at least 175 pecan units are to be found in most places where the southern pecan is successful commercially. This corresponds to a line through Augusta, Milledgeville, Macon and Columbus, Georgia and Montgomery, Alabama. There seems little question but that pecans can be grown north of this line but until I get more positive information than I now have I shall doubt if the planting of southern varieties of pecans much north of this line is nearly as advisable as it is south of it.
When we come to compare this figure with the pecan units for Ocean Springs and Pascagoula, Miss., where a number of the fine southern pecans originated which are now being propagated we find an average of about 222 pecan units. To reduce this to a percentage we find that many of the standard southern pecans grow and bear well when the pecan units are as low as 79% of those of the place of their origin. In other words the adaptability of the southern pecan is 79%, that is it will grow and bear well where the pecan units are as low as 79% of those of the place of its origin or to use rough figures, 80%.
When we come to ascertain the pecan units of the locations where the northern pecan grows and bears well we will consider Evansville and Vincennes, Ind., as places where it bears well; Burlington, Ia., as a place where it does quite well, but not as well, as in Evansville; Clinton, Ia., as a place where trees are growing well but where they bear a large crop only once in several years; and Charles City, Ia., as a place where the pecan does not mature its nuts. The pecan units are also shown for several important places outside of the native pecan area.
| Highest | Lowest | Average | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Evansville, Ind. | (1919) | 147.5 | (1917) | 116.4 | 135.7 |
| Vincennes, Ind. | (1914) | 144.7 | (1918) | 123.1 | 130.8 |
| Burlington, Ia. | (1914) | 125.8 | (1917) | 90.2 | 108.4 |
| Clinton, Ia. | (1914) | 109.2 | (1917) | 75.3 | 94.9 |
| Charles City, Ia. | (1914) | 91.2 | (1915) | 65.4 | 78.5 |
| New York City | (1914) | 101.2 | (1917) | 85.2 | 94.3 |
| Lancaster, Penn. | (1919) | 108.7 | (1917) | 84.9 | 98.4 |
| Gettysburg, Penn. | (1919) | 108.4 | (1916) | 89.4 | 100.7 |
| Cincinnati, O. | (1914) | 131.7 | (1917) | 88.9 | 109.5 |
| Baltimore, Md. | (1919) | 127.2 | (1917) | 106.7 | 121.0 |
| Washington, Md. | (1918) | 126.8 | (1917) | 104.7 | 119.3 |
| Hartford, Conn. | (1919) | 88.9 | (1917) | 74.8 | 85.1 |
If we consider that Evansville and Vincennes are the center of the pecan district near which most varieties have originated and that a place should have 80% as many pecan units as in this Evansville district in order to have the northern pecan do well, a place should have 105 pecan units in order for one to feel reasonably certain that the northern pecan will do well there. It will be both interesting and instructive to see how well the applications that may be made from the conclusions compare with observed facts.
We know that there are large numbers of pecan trees at Burlington, Ia., and that the trees grow and bear well. Its pecan units are 108.4. We should conclude that at Baltimore and Washington with pecan units at 121.0 and 119.3 respectively that pecans would grow and bear well. There are pecan trees over 100 years old at Marietta, Md., which is half way between Baltimore and Washington. These trees bear nuts and although it has not been possible to get bearing records it is evident that they bear considerably for on the roads of that vicinity are hundreds of young pecan trees which evidently came up from nuts borne by these old trees. We should expect the pecan to do well at Cincinnati, O. In fact I have been expecting to find it native there, but, so far all inquiries have failed to do so. At Fayetteville, however, which is about 40 miles east of Cincinnati and somewhat north of it, are bearing pecan trees raised from seed brought from Shawneetown, Ill., which is in the Evansville district. Seed from these Fayetteville trees planted at Baldwin have shown nearly 100% germination.
There is some question as to how well pecans should bear at Gettysburg, and Lancaster, Penn., and at New York City where the pecan units are much like those at Clinton, Ia., where, on forest pecan trees, we get a fair crop but once in several years. Perhaps with our present knowledge these places should be considered on the borderland between the country where the pecan is likely to do well and that where it will not mature its nuts. We know that pecan trees have borne nuts at Aspers, Pa., near Gettysburg, at Lancaster, Pa., and at Westbury and Glen Cove, Long Island, near New York City but so far it has not been possible to make sufficient observations to form definite conclusions as to what to expect. It seems quite likely that fertilization and care may help materially the maturing of crops in those sections which in our present knowledge we must consider on the borderland.
Probably we should not expect pecan nuts to be borne at Charles City, Ia., where pecan units are but 60% of those at Vincennes, and pecan units at Hartford, Conn., are not so very different. There are northern pecan trees at Charles City, Ia., which many years ago were brought there, but the information I have about them is that they have never borne. There is a large pecan tree at Hartford, Conn., but I have never been able to learn of its bearing nuts.
As the northern pecan trees now being planted get to bearing age we shall have actual experimental data as to what they will do in the different sections. Until that time by the method outlined herein and with the Weather Bureau Records for several years at hand inquiries regarding its probable adaptability for a given section can be answered with far more confidence than was possible heretofore.
The President: Is there any discussion upon the excellent paper just read by our treasurer?
Mr. Jordan: May I ask if, according to that theory, the Stuart and the Schley would not be expected to do well in Washington?
Mr. Bixby: I should say not. My intention was to indicate roughly a dividing line between where the pecan would be an important commercial crop and where it would not. We know the Stuart pecan bears pretty well at Petersburg, Virginia; it bears at Aspers, Pa., which is near Gettysburg, but the nuts are a fraction of the normal size and not very well filled.
The Secretary: We all appreciate the amount of work that is represented by this report of Mr. Bixby and how valuable it is from a scientific as well as from a practical point of view. I wonder if it could be made more useful if Mr. Bixby could make a little map showing the isothermal lines on the basis that he has followed in his investigation.
Mr. Bixby: That could be done in a very general way, but altitude makes such a difference that there would be many places included in any belt at which, probably, certain pecans would not grow nor would not mature. It is very evident that local conditions make a great difference. I should say that a map to be useful would probably have a series of dots all over the country indicating what pecans would be best grown in that section; and while that would, to a certain extent, form belts yet there could be selected many places in any one belt where another pecan would be preferable.
Mr. J. W. Ritchie: I started in this nut-growing business knowing nothing about it. I found that there were men in it who had been working at it for years who knew many things that I wanted to know. They forgot that I knew nothing and that I might want to know some of the things that they had in their minds which gave them a background. I think there ought to be some way by which all this knowledge that we have can be brought together so that a beginner could pay a dollar or a dollar and a half or, if necessary, two or three dollars and get it all at once. I have visited Washington and have seen Mr. Littlepage. He showed me some Kentucky hickories and Stabler walnuts and I then decided that if I could raise any nuts there would be no trouble about selling them. I can sell just as many of those nuts as I can produce; but yet I do not know a thing about how many nuts will grow on a Kentucky hickory in one year. If you will lay the facts before me and let me judge them I will take the risk myself. I do not want anybody to tell me whether to plant nuts or not to plant them. I will decide that question for myself if you will give me the data to work on. I want a book that will give me the varieties. I want to know what particular nuts can be put out in this region here that would have a chance of commercial success. Then I would like to know as much as I possibly can about those varieties, their respective qualities, what they will produce and especially how to propagate them. I happen to have a place where there are a great many walnuts, butternuts and hickories. I would like to know, in detail, how to propagate those nuts. In a conversation with the secretary he spoke of northern pecans. I have read about the Marquardt, the Burlington and the Witte. I do not know whether the term "northern" included those three or not.
Treasurer Bixby: I would be very useful if I could directly answer a good many of the questions that are asked. A great many people would like to know the pecan they can plant in their sections and be sure of success. That I would like to tell them. I do not have the information. It is frequently more difficult to answer questions than to ask them.
Regarding the Burlington and the Witte pecans, they come from the most northern section where good pecans have been found, where the heat units are the lowest. They come from Burlington, Iowa, where the heat units are 180, if I remember correctly. If we assume a place where the heat units are 80 per cent of those at Burlington, those pecans should grow and mature there. They would probably do fairly well in New York City. I think we might feel justified in saying that they would not do well at Charles City, Iowa, because pecans from near that section, or back north of that section, have been growing for twenty-five or thirty years, and have not fruited. There the pecan units are very low, only 78. It would seem reasonable that at places where the pecan units are somewhat over 90, including New York City, Lancaster, southern Pennsylvania, and of course practically all sections south of it, they ought to do well. Those are the safest pecans, the Marquardt, the Burlington, the Witte, and the Green Bay, to plant in the northern section.
Mr. Littlepage: The Stuart pecan originally stood within fifty feet of the Gulf of Mexico. There is where it originated. It is one of the leading southern nuts; and yet I saw a Stuart bearing nuts in Mr. Roper's orchard down at Petersburg, Virginia. It has grown beautifully. There is a strictly southern pecan, nurtured by the waters of the Gulf of Mexico, which has the widest latitude. You can find the same thing up north. The fact that the Burlington grows at Burlington, Iowa, means this, that it ought to grow in all similar latitudes, or else violate known laws of horticulture. But it does not mean that some other pecan that grew 250 miles south of that might not grow still further north. The questions asked are important. Why does not the association, just as fast as it gets information, stick a pin there and fasten it down? For example, will pecan trees grow, say, on the thirty-ninth parallel, which runs through my grove down in Maryland. They will. Will they bear? There is one Major there that has this summer fifty pecans on it; another one there with perhaps a dozen. On the 27th day of March of this year, which was Easter Sunday, the temperature dropped sixty-eight degrees in twenty-four hours. It is a wonder it did not kill the forest trees. But with all that the pecan stood there just as hardy as the oak. It destroyed some of the ends of the swelling buds, not the dormant buds but some of those that had begun to swell a little, and that no doubt affected the crop or we would have had, perhaps, all the varieties, the Butterick, the Warrick, the Niblack, the Busseron, the Major, and the Green River fruiting. Do we want to grow a Major? I do not know. But the man that makes the mistake is the man who fails to set nut trees. How about the Stabler walnut bearing? It bore matured nuts at the age of four years on my farm in Maryland this year. The nuts are here. That answers that question. I have very grave doubts about pecan trees thriving in the Lancaster latitude; yet it may be that I am wrong about that. There may be some particular variety that will thrive here. If I lived in this section I would set out the trees so that when the one, two, three or four varieties are found that will thrive here we will have something to work on. There isn't any question about the black walnut or filbert thriving here, or the hickory, because we find them growing. If you go through southern Michigan and northern Indiana, you will see the shagbark hickory by the thousands growing along the railroad. This association should endeavor to get some affirmative data and distribute it among its members.
I have a row of Indian hazels. I put them on the side of my garage to make a sort of a screen because they grow those big crinkling pretty leaves. That row is probably fifteen feet long. If I had forty acres of those hazels with the same quantity of nuts on that are on there this year I could buy another farm.
Mr. Olcott: I would like to ask about Evansville, Indiana.
Mr. Littlepage: Evansville, Indiana, is almost exactly on the thirty-eighth parallel. The Busseron pecan tree grows almost exactly on the thirty-ninth parallel which is the northern boundary of the District of Columbia. The big orange groves in California are at the Lancaster latitude, which shows just how such things twist and turn, how difficult it is to learn them and why it is going to take a lot of experience to work them out.
The Secretary: I knew that Mr. Jones was a very patient and a very courteous gentleman; but I did not suppose that his patience and his courtesy would enable him to sit there for nearly a half hour with, lying in his lap unopened, the new book on nut culture which has just been published by Dr. Morris, probably the first copy that you or I have seen. I see that Mr. Jones has finally yielded to temptation and has uncovered the book. Perhaps that is the book that will supply Mr. Ritchie's needs. I mention it now because I think that you all ought to know that such a book has been published by Dr. Morris and that it can be bought of the MacMillan Company, Publishers, of New York City.
Mr. McGlennon: I think Mr. Jones has overlooked the following on the fly leaf of Dr. Morris's book:
"To J. F. Jones, first authority in the world today
on the subject of nut growing. With the compliments
of one of his pupils, Robert T. Morris.
"New York, October 3, 1921"
(Applause).
The President: If there is no further discussion along this particular line, we will now receive the report of the committee on grades of membership.
Treasurer Bixby: The committee recommends that Article II of the By-Laws be amended so as to read as follows:
"Annual members shall pay two dollars annually, or three dollars and twenty-five cents including a year's subscription to the American Nut Journal. Contributing members shall pay five dollars annually, this membership including a year's subscription to the American Nut Journal. Life members shall make one payment of fifty dollars and shall be exempt from further dues. Honorary members shall be exempt from dues."
It was moved and seconded that the report of the committee be adopted and the amendment to the by-laws made as therein recommended.
(Motion carried unanimously).
The Treasurer: I would like to give notice of our intention, at the next regular meeting, of moving to amend Article III of the Constitution, by adding to the same the following:
"There shall be four classes of members: Annual, contributing, life and honorary. Annual, contributing and life members shall be entitled to all rights and privileges of the association. Honorary members shall be entitled to all rights and privileges of the association, excepting those of holding office and voting at meetings."
The President: Notice has been duly made and will be filed in the proceedings of the session.
We have with us Prof. F. N. Fagan to whom I am sure you will be glad to listen at this time in connection with the work that is being carried on at State College with which institution he is connected.
Professor Fagan: At the Rochester meeting we reported on an English walnut survey that was made in Pennsylvania. Since that time we have not done anything except with Mr. Jones's and Mr. Rush's help, to gather information about the parent trees of which we located definitely about three thousand and indefinitely probably two thousand more. All of these trees but one were in bearing. They were seedling trees and as much variation was found in the trees as we would naturally expect to find in seedling trees. Our problem is to determine the trees worthy of propagation. It is necessary also to solve better the propagation problem. We cannot expect to get any large amount of planting of any of our nut trees until we can put the trees to the public at a price at which it will feel that it can afford to invest. To the members of this association, or to other people vitally interested, two or two and a half or three dollars is not anything for a good tree; but to the average planter of home ground or farmstead that is too much money. We all know that it is not an easy task to propagate these trees and we are not condemning the nurserymen. We know that they cannot afford to grow a budded or a grafted tree of known parentage for any less. So the problem of propagation is one of the largest that we have before us, and it is one to which our station and I myself are giving all the thought and time that we can.
We realize the importance of the nut industry in the state if for no more than roadside and home planting. Whether commercial planting will extend through the north with our black walnuts, our butternuts, our hickories and our English walnuts, to the extent that it has in the south with the pecan, is a question which time alone can solve.
We now have new land at the station suitable for the planting of nut trees. It is going to be the best land that we have on our new farm and we hope next spring to make a collection planting of varieties. We have not much money but we can make a start. It is not going to be at a place that will be set aside and not cared for. It is going to be along the public road, where we will have to take care of it or we will be criticised.
Until we solve our problems of selection and propagation we will go along at a fair rate of increase in regard to our plantings; but we will not reach the man who has a piece of ground and who says, "I would like to plant that ground in walnuts, maybe fifteen or twenty trees but I cannot put thirty dollars into those trees, or twenty dollars when I can buy apple trees for twenty cents."
Yet the future looks just as bright to me as it did the day I started to make the English walnut survey, just as bright because we will overcome these obstacles.
I might close by saying that while we are ready at the college and at the experiment station to go ahead we are not ready to plunge into any extensive experiments. It requires money and the money does not come in such quantities that we can plunge into anything in fact. But we are ready to begin to build a foundation on which we expect later on to experiment, and I hope that in ten more years, or in nine more years, if this association comes back to Pennsylvania, we can invite them to the experiment station to see what foundations we have laid and what progress we have made in the experimental work of nut culture.
The President: Will there be any discussion on the subject so ably covered by Prof. Fagan? Are there any questions that you desire to ask the Professor?
The Secretary: I would like to ask Prof. Fagan if he has a good word to say for the English walnut in Pennsylvania and in other parts of the country as a profitable tree to plant, from the result of his inspection of the trees of the state.
Prof. Fagan: We get a letter probably on an average of once a week, from some one in the State of Pennsylvania who wants to plant anywhere from five acres to a hundred acres in English walnuts. We tell him to go slow, to feel his ground out pretty well and to remember that he is planting a tree that is a greater feeder, probably, than any other fruit tree; that it must have food or it won't grow; and instead of planting a hundred acres to plant maybe half an acre and select the best varieties that information at the present time indicates, those that lived through the winter of 1917-1918.
We have seedling trees in Pennsylvania, that probably date back to near revolutionary war times; in fact there are some around Germantown that no doubt were growing at the time of the revolutionary war, around the old Germantown Academy. Personally I would not hesitate to plant as good an acre of land as there is in Lancaster County, or ten or twenty or fifty acres, to the better types of English walnuts that we have today. It probably would not be profitable in my time; I do not know; but it certainly would be profitable in the lifetime of my children. I would not, however, want to plant the nuts on cheap and poor mountain land where the most of our larger plantings, even of chestnut, have been made throughout the country, on land that was not worth the attention of other crops. When people write to us that they have certain types of land we always tell them if they can grow an average crop of corn, wheat, clover or potatoes on that land there probably isn't any question but that if they plant English walnuts they will be successful in raising some English walnuts. Whether they will raise them profitably or not is another question. But nothing can take the place of one or two good trees on every farm, especially in southeastern Pennsylvania. There isn't much question but that those trees can be grown successfully from a line through Allentown to the Susquehanna River, and on over to the general range of the Allegheny Mountains, down to the Mainland and West Virginia line. Even in our higher elevations of sixteen or eighteen hundred feet I can show you some good old bearing trees that are ten or twelve inches in diameter. No dwelling houses there. They are out in the country and they are high up.
The Secretary: As has been stated the essential thing in the successful growing of Persian walnuts, and probably other nuts, is high fertilization. I believe that many of our failures to grow the Persian walnut are due to lack of sufficient food.
The Treasurer: I do not suppose that any one in the association has made more of an effort to get better records than I have—at least I have made a good deal of effort. I have learned that in 1916, if I remember correctly, the Stabler bore sixteen bushels of hulled nuts and it was estimated that two were washed away by the rains. In another year, I was informed the Weiker tree bore twelve bushels. In following up other trees I found it impossible to get any results. I tried to get information as to the parent Hales hickory and the most I could learn was that the family had gathered as high as two or three bushels in one year. But when I saw that the tree stood on the side of a well traveled road with only a low stone wall to get over, and that the squirrels were plentiful and the children undoubtedly likewise, I thought it a wonder that the Hales got any of the nuts.
In the case of most of our fine parent nut trees they are either situated in out-of-the-way places where it is a task to get to them, or else they are situated on the side of a traveled road where the passersby are pretty likely to get a great many of the nuts.
Take the case of the Fairbanks hickory in Alamosa, Iowa. It stands on the side of the road on top of a hill outside of the limit of the houses of the town. I do not see how it can help being that a great proportion of the nuts are picked up by passersby. When we have grafted trees planted where they can be protected and the crop can be watched we can get reliable data for our records; but I am afraid that except in a few instances, we cannot get such data for the parent trees.
Mr. Rush: California is the leader in the Persian walnut industry and I think it would be better for us to fall in line and adopt some of their varieties. I find that they are perfectly hardy here, just as hardy as are varieties that have been grown here for a hundred years.
Mr. L. N. Spencer: Right back of the postoffice are some English walnut trees. They are growing very nicely. They have withstood all kinds of weather. I have not noticed any dead limbs on the trees nor any other indications that the climate here is not adapted to the growing of these trees. We would be glad indeed to show you the trees if you would come to the postoffice. They are not on ground belonging to the United States government but on private ground.
I have been very much interested in your discussion. I came here because I expect to set out some more nut trees.
The President: There are two items of business left for the convention. One is, receiving the report of the nominating committee; the other is, to determine upon a place for holding our next convention. If there is nothing further to be brought before the session by the members these two items will now receive our consideration. The first of the two would be the report of the nominating committee.
Mr. Olcott: Your nominating committee respectfully reports the following nominations for officers of the Northern Nut Growers' Association for the coming fiscal year:
President—James S. McGlennon, Rochester, N. Y.
Vice-President—J. F. Jones, Lancaster, Pa.
Secretary—William C. Deming, Wilton, Conn.
Treasurer—Willard G. Bixby, Baldwin, N. Y.
Your committee begs leave to suggest that as the details of an aggressive campaign to increase the membership of the Association entail a considerable amount of correspondence and other work, the Secretary should be relieved to as great an extent as is practicable, and to that end particular attention should be paid to the selection of a Membership Committee. It is the belief that this is one of the most important committees of the Association and that systematic endeavor upon definite lines should be made to extend the membership; that this work should begin at once and be maintained earnestly throughout the coming fiscal year.
| RALPH T. OLCOTT, |
| J. F. JONES, |
| JOHN RICK, |
| C. S. RIDGWAY, |
| Committee. |
Mr. Littlepage: I move the adoption of the report.
(Motion seconded and carried, and the officers therein referred to were declared elected.)
The President: The second item is to determine the place of the next meeting. A motion would be in order covering that.
The Treasurer: Inasmuch as we have in Rochester, New York, an orchard of filberts which is beginning to bear real crops—and that is something none of us has ever seen—if Rochester would like to have us come I move that we go there next year.
Mr. Olcott: Rochester would like to have you come.
Mr. McGlennon: I was going to ask that the convention be brought to Rochester next year. I would certainly like to see it there. I second Mr. Bixby's motion.
(Motion carried unanimously.)
It was moved and seconded that the next annual convention be held on September 7 and 8, 1922.
(Motion carried unanimously.)
Mr. Littlepage moved (seconded by Mr. McGlennon) that Mr. Harrison H. Dodge, Superintendent of Mount Vernon, be elected an honorary member of this association.
(Motion carried unanimously.)
The President: I desire to say that in this package I have four seedlings from the walnuts that were supplied from Mount Vernon. A few of the walnuts left from last year's supply were placed in the hands of a nurseryman or florist in Saginaw too late for planting—the ground had become frozen—and those few nuts be placed in pots in his greenhouse. They grew very vigorously and I have four of those in little earthen pots for planting this afternoon.
Mr. McGlennon: I make a motion that a vote of thanks be extended to Dr. Morris and the others whose papers were read by our secretary yesterday morning and that they be notified accordingly.
Senator Penney: I second the motion.
(Motion carried unanimously.)
The Secretary: I feel that we should express our appreciation of the efforts of the local committee and the management of this hotel. I therefore move a vote of thanks to Mr. Rush and Mr. Jones for their work in the management of this convention, and to the management of the hotel for the kindness they have shown us.
Mr. Littlepage: I second the motion.
(Motion carried unanimously.)
The President: We will now adjourn to gather here at two o'clock in order to go on a sight-seeing trip or excursion around the city and county and then to Long's Park at 4:30 o'clock for the tree planting.