The Asiatic chestnut trees are dwarfish in habit, come into bearing early, the nuts are generally large and some of them of pretty good quality. They may be planted as fillers between the trees of larger growth. The nuts may be bought of importers. (See circular on "Seedsmen and Nurserymen".) The small Korean chestnut has been especially recommended.
If you wish to grow the shagbark hickory (Hicoria ovata) plant the best specimens of this nut you can get, or the bitternut (H. minima) which is said to be a superior stock for grafting.
High hopes are held that that other favorite hickory, the pecan (H. pecan) may be grown far outside its native range, and the Indiana pecan is the nut on which these hopes are founded. Seed nuts may be obtained from reliable Indiana dealers, but it is said that some of them are not reliable.
The hickories may be budded and grafted on one another so that one kind of stock may serve for both shagbark and pecan.
If you want to grow the Persian walnut (Juglans regia), often called the "English" walnut, the black walnut (J. nigra), seems to afford the most promising stock, though J. rupestris, native in Texas and Arizona, has been recommended and J. cordiformis, the Japanese heart nut, is also promising. This nut can be recommended for planting for its own sake as the tree is hardy, a rapid grower, comes into bearing early and bears a fairly good nut. There are no grafted trees, however, so the variable seedlings will have to be depended upon.
On any of these walnut stocks the black walnut and the butternut (J. cinerea) may also be propagated if worthy varieties can be found. There are none now on the market.
The nuts mentioned are enough for the beginner and the three stocks, chestnut, hickory and walnut, will give him all he wants to work on and furnish plenty of fascinating occupation.
The hazel, the almond and others, though offering possibilities, had better be left to those further advanced in the art of nut growing.
Now the nut orchard is started and the owner must push the growth of the trees by the ordinary methods, cultivation, cover crops and fertilizers. See any authority on growing fruit trees.
In from two to five years the trees will be ready for budding and grafting, they will have made a good growth above ground, and a bigger one below, they are permanently placed and haven't got to be set back a year or two, or perhaps killed, by transplanting, with loss to the tap roots and laterals. In the writer's opinion that natural tap root of the nut tree growing down, down to water is not to be treated as of no importance.