The third session of the convention was called to order at 9:50 A.M. with the president, Dr. J. Russell Smith, in the chair. The opening attendance was twenty-eight persons.
The President: Owing to the fact that business needs to be predigested, we have decided to postpone the amendments to the constitution until this evening's session. We think it will take but a short time to discuss them. Resolutions, informal discussion on seedlings, the chestnut, and similar topics will also be brought up at that time. This morning's session, therefore, will be devoted to the intellectual, rather than the business end.
I know of no subject in which there is greater possibility of securing knowledge than the question of nuts for the north. A few years ago a friend of mine wrote me he had bought some land, and was planting native walnuts in the fence corners to be topworked with English walnuts. I wrote him, recommending oranges instead, telling him he would lose less money. I was basing this advice upon my own bitter experience. The accumulations of nut knowledge in the last few years and the trees now growing on my own place show how ridiculous was my position of a short time ago. This morning I think we are likely to have somewhat similar surprises in a paper by Dr. Morris. He will give us information on the hazel nut, giving his experience with the European varieties.
NOTES ON THE HAZELS
Dr. Robert T. Morris, New York City
The hazels are descended from an ancient and honorable family. Impressions of leaves found in the Upper Cretaceous rocks of the Yellowstone Valley cannot be distinguished from those of the leaves of our two American hazel species of today.
The hazels belong to the Cupuliferae or oak family. Our American species are only two in number, although there are many varieties of the species. The one which is most prized, Corylus americana, is found over a wide range of territory and abundantly in many places between Canada and the southern extremity of the Appalachians, and from the central Mississippi valley to the Atlantic coast.
This species bears nuts of excellent quality for the most part, but of rather small size and thick shell, excepting in individual plants. The common American hazel, while valuable for hybridizing purposes, will probably never be cultivated to any great extent, because of its habit of growth.
The characteristic life history in the Eastern States is as follows: A hazel plant bears a few nuts in its third year, a fairly large crop in its fourth year, a heavy crop in its fifth year, a very few nuts in its sixth year and it dies at the seventh or eighth year of age. Meanwhile, the plant has been sending out long stoloniferous roots which have surrounded the original plant with a chaplet of progeny, each one of which follows the life course of the parent.