HAZELS AND FILBERTS
The filberts have not proved entirely hardy for northern territory, but the native hazels and hybrids appear to be entirely satisfactory. The lists are too long to publish. Full and reliable information is contained in Prof. Slate's paper in this report.
Nut Culture in the North
By J. F. Wilkinson
Rockport, Indiana
There being other papers on the subject of nut culture I will confine this to Indiana and surrounding territory where nut trees of several kinds are native, and flourished before the coming of the white man.
Walnut and hickory trees are to be found growing on most kinds of soil, chestnut and hazels mostly on hill land, the pecan as a rule in the lowlands along the streams where vast groves of them are yet producing splendid crops of nuts.
One mile from my nursery, around Enterprise (which was the boyhood home of our worthy member Mr. T. P. Littlepage), are hundreds of these trees, including one of the largest in Indiana. This tree measures 16 feet in circumference at waist height and is estimated to be 125 feet high. It has produced more than 500 pounds of nuts in a season and other trees near here have produced as much as 600 pounds. One of these has a spread of over 100 feet. It is not unusual for a large size tree to produce from 300 to 400 pounds of a good season.
One of the largest groves near here is known as the Major grove near the mouth of Green River, containing about 300 acres, most of the trees on which are pecan trees. Some are of immense size and probably as large as can be found north of the cotton belt. A few trees in this grove are estimated to be more than 150 feet tall.
Along the Wabash River is probably the largest native northern pecan grove consisting of several hundred acres in which it is estimated there are more than 20,000 bearing-size pecan trees. At gathering time in the fall this is a very busy place. It is a source of revenue to many besides the owners.
I was at this grove two weeks ago and was told there that each year school begins the first of August so they can dismiss during October and November to allow the school children to gather pecans during those two months. School teachers in that territory are required to sign a contract to that effect. This grove lies between Shawneetown and New Haven, which are eighteen miles apart.
The town of New Haven has a population of about 400. I was told last fall by one of the three pecan buyers there that, in one day a few years ago, the three of them paid more than $15,000 for pecans for one day's delivery. This of course did not represent the total day's sales for this territory as many of them were sold at Shawneetown. So one can easily see why the people there are anxious for their children to help in this harvest, it being the chief source of fall income to many poor people, who are given one-half of all the pecans they gather. Often on or after a windy day the amount gathered by each one makes a splendid day's wages. Many make a practice of coming a distance each fall for this harvest. One party from St. Louis told me last fall that was his twenty-sixth year at that grove.
This grove is surrounded by smaller ones and many single trees growing on cultivated land. None of the native nut trees in this section have ever had any care whatever, except the ones growing in cultivated fields, and those only farm crop cultivation. Many of the native seedlings seldom bear and some others are shy or irregular bearers. But it is noticeable how much better as a rule those produce that have farm crop cultivation or stand in favorable locations.
This is plainly evident in many instances where trees in the last few years have been cleared around and cultivated, or where an individual tree is standing alone without cultivation, but has plenty of space, food and moisture. An excellent example of this is the Littlepage tree in Enterprise that is probably 35 years old, has never been cultivated but stands in a well used stock lot and has been an annual bearer since a small tree.
On the other hand, near here are a number of trees around which the land had been cultivated in farm crops until about ten years ago, and these trees produced well, but since that time the land has been abandoned and has grown up in a thicket and the production of these trees has been greatly reduced.
About twenty years ago propagation of the better varieties of northern nut trees was begun in southern Indiana. At that time I believe that most of us overlooked the needs of nut trees as we had been used to their taking care of themselves. Our attention to them was mostly at nut harvest time. We failed to take into consideration the conditions under which the best bearing trees were growing and too strongly condemned those not bearing so well, when it was often due to conditions instead of to the trees themselves.
The walnut and hickory will succeed and bear with less moisture than the pecan, though they will do better with plenty of moisture if on well drained land and having good cultivation. We failed to take in consideration that the best bearing pecan trees were growing on low land that was usually overflowed one or more times each season, leaving plenty of moisture and a deposit of plant food. Many articles have been written by nut tree enthusiasts in which the planting of nut trees on unproductive or waste land has been advised. In this the writers were sincere in their statements. This advice has been taken by many, causing more or less disappointment to the planter and no encouragement to his neighbor. No successful fruit grower would plant an orchard of peach or apple trees on poor or waste land, forget about them for a few years and expect to go back and harvest a crop of fruit, and neither need the nut grower expect to.
Since many trees of the named varieties have been in bearing for a number of years it gives a broad field for studying them, and their habits are very similar to the native trees, I do not know of a single tree that is not a testimonial to the care and attention it has been given.
In my first nursery planting trees were left growing to supply bud and graftwood for future use. These were left entirely too close together to remain until large trees, but I have never yet had nerve enough to remove all that should be taken out, with the result that they are now crowding and robbing each other of food and moisture retarding both growth and bearing. These are now from 15 to 19 years old and not producing as many nuts as they did several years ago, or as many as trees several years younger that have more space. My observations convince me that plenty of space, food and moisture are most essential for best results.
The past four years has been a splendid time to study this as our weather conditions have been unusual in that we have in this section had both wet and dry seasons. I am firmly convinced that weather conditions have a great deal to do with the nut crop not only with the quantity of nuts but quality as well. Moisture conditions in spring and early summer determine the size of the nut, and later in the season the quality of the kernel. Plenty of moisture in spring and early summer will make a large size nut. After the shell once forms the growth of nut is done. Then the plumpness of the kernel depends on the amount of moisture after the shell is formed. Lack of moisture the entire season spells a small, poorly filled nut. Trees growing in a crowded position, or on hard, dry ground, seldom ever have all the moisture they need to produce a good crop of well filled nuts. This has been plainly demonstrated with my own and my neighbors' trees in the past few years.
The weather of the previous season also may have much to do with the crop the following season, especially with trees growing under adverse conditions. These conditions can often be largely overcome by the owner, with fertilizers and cultivation.
In planting a tree be sure to give it plenty of space. If the soil is lacking in plant food feed the tree, remembering it can draw food only from a given space. No one would expect to grow the same farm crop on a plot of ground for many years without fertilizer. Prepare to conserve moisture for the hot, dry season either by cultivation or mulching. One of the thriftiest best bearing nut tree plantings I know of is on very sharp, hilly clay ground in Rockport, but the owner fertilizes these trees annually and gives splendid cultivation.
A non-bearing nut tree is no better than any other kind of a tree, so it is not a question of how many nut trees you have, but how many good bearing nut trees you have. To get the best results provide your trees with space, food and moisture.
Varieties of Nut Trees for the Northernmost Zone
By C. A. Reed, Bureau of Plant Industry United States Department of Agriculture
The northernmost zone of the eastern part of the United States, within which conditions appear at all encouraging for the planting of the hardiest varieties of nut trees now available, may be outlined as covering the milder portions of Massachusetts, Rhode Island, Connecticut, New York, Michigan, Wisconsin, Minnesota and South Dakota. Beyond the Canadian border this zone should perhaps include the fruit belt of Ontario known as the "Niagara Peninsula," which skirts Lake Ontario from the City of Hamilton to the Niagara river. No doubt it should also include considerable Canadian territory immediately adjacent to Lakes Erie and St. Clair, and north to the lower end of Lake Huron.
In each American state within this general zone there are numerous localities to which several species of edible nuts are indigenous, others where the butternut alone is found, and still others to which none of the common kinds appear to be adapted. Climate and soil are both limiting factors within this general section. No nut trees are likely to prove hardy to the extent of bearing heavily where winter temperatures are extremely trying or where soils are not of high grade. A fundamental principle involving plant ecology, which with reference to planted nut trees is too often lost sight of, is that, regardless of species, plants are unlikely to be altogether hardy in any locality where minimum temperatures of winter are appreciably lower, or growing periods much shorter, than at the place where the variety in question originated. For example, it is often assumed that a pecan tree native to southern Texas, the lowest point of the range of this species in the United States, should do well in southeastern Iowa, the northernmost point within the range. Likewise, it is also sometimes assumed that a black walnut variety originating in Arkansas, Texas or Tennessee should be hardy in the black walnut belts of New York, Michigan, Wisconsin, Minnesota, Pennsylvania, or wherever the species is indigenous or has been successfully transplanted.
There are definite degrees of hardiness which must not be overlooked. A species or variety may be hardy enough to grow thriftily for many years, and to make a splendid tree, hundreds of miles north of the latitude at which it will mature occasional crops; or it may be able to produce crops that are frequent in occurrence yet indifferent as to character; or there may be occasional crops of first-class nuts; but good crops of good nuts are exceedingly rare when the minimum temperatures of winter or the length of the growing period are appreciably more adverse than in the locality where the variety originated.
A few illustrations may help to make these points clearer. On the Experimental Farm of the U. S. Department of Agriculture at Arlington, Va., directly opposite Washington, on the Potomac, there are five pecan trees of the Schley variety which originated on the Gulf coast of Mississippi. These trees have grown splendidly since being planted more than 20 years ago. They blossomed and set nuts more or less regularly after they were about eight or ten years of age, but it was only in the eighteenth year that a season was late enough in fall for a single nut to mature. Another case is afforded by a pecan seedling, probably from Texas, called to the writer's attention by Dr. W. C. Deming, Hartford, Conn., which stands near the outskirts of that city. This is a large, beautiful tree. It rarely sets crops of nuts, and when it does the nuts fail to become more than half or two-thirds normal size by the time of autumn frosts. The kernels are then quite undeveloped and the nuts therefore worthless each year.
In another case, near Ithaca, New York, the Stabler walnut from Maryland and the Ohio from Toledo, of the state after which it was named, all appear to be congenially situated insofar as environment is concerned until the nuts are actually harvested and cured. The nuts of each variety appear normal when they drop from the trees, but during the process of curing, the kernels wither up too badly to be marketable. The Thomas from southeastern Pennsylvania is somewhat better able to adjust itself to Ithaca conditions, but it is far from being a commercial success in that region.