The future of hazel nut production in this section evidently depends upon the development of our native species or by hybridizing with some of the foreign species.
In concluding this article, it may not be amiss to throw out the following suggestions as to the steps by which all may help in the development of the nut industry:
(1) Ordinarily, stick to the native species.
(2) Plant nuts or seedling trees only when budded or grafted varieties cannot be had, but do not fail to plant nut trees of some kind.
(3) Whenever a tree or shrub is located which because of the superior quality, size, thinness of shell and quantity of nuts appears to be worthy of propagation, specimens should be sent to the officers of this Association; to the State Experiment Stations or to the U. S. Department of Agriculture at Washington, D. C, for examination. (Franks for the mailing of such nuts to the U. S. Department of Agriculture without postage will be sent upon application.)
(4) Nut trees must be accorded the same degree of cultivation and horticultural attention given to other fruit-bearing trees, if commercial production of nuts is to be expected.
President Morris: This interesting paper is now open for discussion. I will start it by saying that the criticism of the Japanese walnut is correct, so far as it goes; but we have there a fine opportunity for good new work, and if the nurseries would take up this question in the right way, they could open up an enormous trade for stock. Let us take the Juglans mandshurica, and the sieboldiana, which have been distributed more than any others over this country because of the beauty of the trees. They grow rapidly, and are tremendously hardy, although not so much so as the best of the Japanese walnuts, the cordiformis. It was found on the Pacific Coast that the cordiformis went largely to wood. In the East, it bears well, is perfectly hardy and the nut is delicious. Individual trees bear thin shelled nuts, and individual trees bear large nuts. In fact, I have seen the nut quite as large as the nut of the average American butternut, and thin shelled, at that. The thing for the large nurseries is not to sell Japanese nuts under that name, but to sell the cordiformis, and sell only that, and only grafted trees. In that way we would get rid of the less desirable varieties, just as with the hickories a thousand and one shagbarks that we find are not remarkable, and yet we will find here and there one that is worth grafting and propagating. It is the same way with the Japanese walnuts, but particularly this cordiformis which is hardy and growing native in a climate which corresponds to Nova Scotia. If the nurseries will put out this nut, grafted, they will have a very valuable nut to give us. I notice that the speaker distinguished a "little shagbark." Now, I wonder if that is not a question worthy of discussion right here. The names shagbark, shellbark, and scaly bark, are applied indifferently to Hicoria ovata, Hicoria cinerea, and Hicoria septentrionalis. We can distinguish them much better if we take different names for the little and the big shagbark,—if we call the little one shagbark and the big one shellbark, it makes a distinction; and the reason why that distinction seems legitimate is that the bark comes off like great sheets from the big shellbark, and the little shagbark has the scales of the bark coming off in smaller scales, shelling off. At the same time, it is more scaly than the other. If we call the shaggy one, Hicoria ovata, shagbark, and call the big western one shellbark, it seems to me a distinction that we may as well make in our discussions, and fix the names in such a way as to afford convenience.
Mr. Reed: My reference was to Hicoria ovata.
President Morris: Yes, that is for the little one, and if we call the laciniosa shellbark, that will make a distinction. Shall we call the little one shagbark, and the big shagbark shellbark, or must we always depend upon the scientific names in classifying?
Mr. Collins: May I call attention to another complication? To botanists who are not particularly nut growers, there is another tree which is known as the little shellbark,—that is the microcarpa, with a nut about one-half to three-quarters of an inch long.