Now another thing. Suppose one plants a cherry tree. To whom do the cherries belong? To the man who planted the tree practically on his premises. But the limbs extend out on the public highway. If I, the owner, take a ladder out there and pick cherries and an automobile comes running past and throws me down I am practically a trespasser on the public highway. I believe I would not plant along the public highway with the idea of getting any fruit from the trees. I think however when you have a railroad going through your premises it is entirely practicable to plant your nut trees alongside the railroad, especially where there is a fill. Where the roots will grow under it and thrive luxuriantly. Nearly every farmer has a small stream running through his premises. You plant your walnut trees or your filbert trees along that stream, and you will have magnificent results. I do not want to be understood as disparaging nut tree planting.
Mr. D. F. Clark: I would like to know if the planting of black walnut trees is discriminated against because of the difficulty of getting the meat out of the nut. I have made a great many experiments and have not been able to get the meat out of the nut in large pieces. Is there some kind of a machine made for that purpose? Black walnut kernels bring a splendid price and if we could get them open right it would be fine.
The Secretary: That difficulty is being taken care of by the improved varieties which are being raised and which you can get on grafted trees.
I am inclined to agree with Mr. Bixby in regard to its being the shade of black walnut trees that affects the crops growing near them rather than the roots of the trees. I have seen the same thing that Mr. Bixby describes, a high-pruned black walnut tree with wheat growing clear up to the trunk. I have photographs of a number of fields in Europe where the English walnut is grown. The trees are pruned high and the wheat grows up close to the trunks of the trees.
I would like to say also that I think it is the purpose of those who advocate the road-side planting of trees not to do it forcibly nor to compel anybody to have trees planted in front of his premises if he does not want them, but to give him a voice in the selection of the kind of trees that should be planted in front of his property. I think that is a necessary thing for the success of the movement, that the co-operation of the property owners should be invited by giving them a voice in the selection of the trees that are planted in their location.
Dr. Rittenhouse: I feel that this matter of the injury caused by a black walnut to surrounding vegetation should be more thoroughly thrashed out. It is doubtful to my mind whether the injury that a black walnut produces on surrounding vegetation is solely due to shade. Seven years ago I planted an apple orchard and some of the young trees began to be injured by a large walnut tree possibly seventy five feet away. The walnut tree happened to be on the line and I got the permission of my neighbor to cut the walnut tree down. The apple trees immediately began to thrive. I thought perhaps it was due to the roots demanding too much moisture from the soil because it was impossible for the shade to do any harm to those young apple trees. There is a superstitious idea among the people of our locality that the black walnut root is injurious to growing vegetation.
Mr. Smedley: In my case the walnut tree was on the opposite side of a public road thirty feet wide and the influence was shown to the second row of apple trees on the other side. I do not think it was the shade in that case. The limbs were pretty high too. It was a public road. I do not think there were any roots that reached the apple trees at all.
Mr. McGlennon: Mr. Rush's reference to the ownership of the crop on trees planted on the road-side is a thought that has occupied my mind, and I have found some consolation in the belief that the ownership of land applies from the center of the roadway. I am not sure about that and I think it is a point that ought to be clarified.
Mr. Smedley: I think in Pennsylvania the public just have the right-of-way there; they have no claim to anything that grows.
The President: In Michigan, the law applies that the ownership goes to the middle of the highway. The recent act of the legislature of our state causes the state highway commissioner to plant trees for the maintenance of the roadway. The planting of the trees he claims benefits the roadway, so that under that application he plants the trees for the maintenance of the road. The distance from the fence line varies. The state highway department of Michigan has a department for the planting of trees since the law introduced by Senator Penney some two or three years ago came into effect. The commissioner varies his planting, sometimes in groups and sometimes in a formal way, according to the stretch of road; but the basis of it all, perhaps, would be thirteen feet from the lot line on each side of the road. Our roads, or at least ninety per cent of them, are sixty-six feet in width. Thirteen feet from the lot line on each side would take twenty-six feet, and planting them forty feet apart in the other direction makes those trees forty feet apart each way. A great majority of the trees being planted in Michigan follow that particular plan, so they are thirteen feet from the property holder's fence line.