Preliminary Results from Training Chinese Chestnut Trees to Different Heights of Head

FOOTNOTES:

[1] Dr. Kathleen G. Doering, at the University of Kansas identified the spittle bug from the Illinois pecans as Clastoptera achatina, a species not hitherto recognized as an important pecan pest. Spittle bugs from southeastern pecans have been referred to a different species.—Ed.

Introduction

Many growers of Chinese chestnut (Castanea mollissima) want to know how soon their young trees may be expected to bear their first crops of nuts. This is determined by several factors, but perhaps one of the most important is the amount and kind of pruning the trees receive during the first four or five years they are in the orchard. One reason for the importance of type of pruning is the characteristic habit of the species to form branches low on the trunk, so that low-headed and spreading tops result if trees are left unpruned.

It has long been accepted by most horticulturists that any kind of pruning of fruit trees tends to be a dwarfing process. Hence, pruned trees would be smaller than similar unpruned trees. Pruning of young fruit trees, though reducing the size of the top and the number of growing points, tends to stimulate the growth of the remaining shoots. This has a marked tendency to delay the formation of fruit buds. Hence, unpruned trees come into bearing earlier than even lightly pruned trees. Tufts (2)[3] reported that lightly pruned deciduous fruit trees, such as apple, pear, apricot, and peach, came into bearing one to three years earlier than similar trees that had been heavily pruned. Crane (1) found that height of head in apple trees had little effect on yield for the first nine years in the orchard, but at the time the experiment was terminated the trees were still too young for him to expect much fruit production. He found, however, that the low-headed trees made more shoot growth and a larger gain in trunk diameter than the high-headed ones, and thus the bearing area was larger. Because the tree form of the horticultural varieties of Chinese chestnut is somewhat comparable to that of apple varieties, it would be expected that the two might give similar growth and yield responses to pruning or training procedures. The experiment described in this paper was initiated for the purpose of determining the response made by trees of Chinese chestnut varieties pruned and trained to three heights of head.

Experimental Procedure

The three varieties used in the experiment are Meiling, Nanking, and an unnamed variety carried under the accession number 7916. The last variety is characterized by dwarf, heavy-bearing trees that mature their crops very early in the fall, whereas Meiling and Nanking are vigorous, fast-growing varieties that mature their nuts in midseason. In the early spring of 1948 thirty-six two-year-old grafted trees were planted 25 feet apart in the orchard in four short rows of nine trees each. The three treatments consisted of (1) no pruning; (2) pruning to a 2-foot head; and (3) pruning to a 4-foot head. Three trees, one of each variety, were included in a plot or treatment. Thus, the experiment was arranged in a randomized block design with the three treatments randomized in each row and the four rows serving as replications. Each spring the trees received a liberal application of a 10-6-5 fertilizer. Strips six to eight feet wide on each side of the contoured rows received frequent cultivation each growing season, while strips of orchard grass sod were left between the rows to prevent erosion. The soil is Riverdale (tentative series) sandy loam that had been in orchard grass sod for ten years before the experiment was begun. It has been necessary to spray the trees each year with DDT, parathion, or both to control Japanese beetles and mites.

Pruning of the trees was begun during the first winter following the planting in the orchard, but only a few of the lower limbs were removed in order not to dwarf the pruned trees severely. The second winter a few more lower limbs were removed and at this time the two-foot-head treatments were complete. A third pruning was necessary before the heads of the trees in treatment three could be raised to four feet. Detailed records and measurements were made of the diameter of each tree trunk one foot above the ground, and of the weight and number of nuts produced (yield).

Experimental Results

Table 1. Effects of training to different heights of head on the average diameter of tree trunk and yield of nuts of three varieties of Chinese chestnuts at the end of the third season (1950) after transplanting

Treatment	Average diameter of tree trunk (millimeters)				Yield of nuts (pounds)				Number of nuts
Treatment	Meiling	No. 7916	Nanking	Tree average	Meiling	No. 7916	Nanking	Tree average	Meiling	No. 7916	Nanking	Tree average
No pruning	43	43*	47	45	.19	.43*	.05	.16	11	22*	2	10
2-foot heads	25	19	21	22	0	.12	0	.04	0	7	0	2
4-foot heads	27	22	25	25	0	.03	0	.01	1	4	0	2

Data on the diameters of the tree trunks and yields of nuts at the end of the third year in the orchard are given in table 1. It should be pointed out first that these grafted trees produced some nuts the third growing season they were in the orchard. This is very much earlier than seedling trees ordinarily could be expected to bear nuts. It will be noted that trees of Number 7916 developed a somewhat smaller trunk on the average than the other varieties did, but Number 7916 outyielded them about two to one, both in weight and in number of nuts produced. The tendency of Number 7916 to bear nuts earlier and on smaller trees than other varieties may prove to be a valuable characteristic that will justify naming and releasing this clone as a new variety. The fact that it matures its nuts early may also make it suitable for growing in more northerly areas than other varieties, because the length of season required for maturing the crop presumably is shorter than for other varieties. However, this cannot be determined without extensive tests in the North, which are now being made by a number of growers.

It will be noted also in table 1 that the trunk diameters of the unpruned trees were about twice as great as were those of trees trained to two-and four-foot heads; and furthermore, the yield of nuts was more than four times as great. This means that cutting off the limbs that formed below the 2-foot level checked growth so that the bearing surface of the tops was greatly reduced as compared with that of unpruned trees. Also, growth of the tops of these trees was etiolated and spindly, and the shoots produced few or no catkins as compared with the abundant catkins produced by the unpruned trees. Several of the trees with four-foot heads became so top-heavy that staking was necessary, and nearly all the pruned trees leaned to some extent. At the end of the third year in the orchard, the unpruned trees were much taller than trees headed at two and four feet, and the spread of branches was also much greater. Preliminary results from this experiment indicate that early pruning of young Chinese chestnut trees causes severe dwarfing and consequent delay in the formation of catkins and the bearing of nuts. All pruning operations should, therefore, be delayed until the trees reach bearing age, and from that time on low limbs may be removed gradually from year to year until the trees are trained to the proper height.

Literature Cited

(1) Crane, H. L.
The effect of height of head on young apple tree growth and yield
West Virginia Agr. Exp. Sta. Bul. 214. 1928

(2) Tufts, Warren P.
Pruning young deciduous fruit trees
California Agr. Exp. Sta. Bull. 313: 111-153. 1919

Discussion

DR. McKAY: These trees were grafted on two year old stock and allowed to grow a year. They were three years old. They have grown in the orchard three years, so they are now six years old and about five feet high.

They were grafted about a foot from the ground and they grew three feet or so. They were a good size grafted tree.

MR. SHERMAN: I have been pruning some Persian walnuts. Just as the side branch starts I rub that bud off and I can't see that I am dwarfing it any.

MEMBER: Maybe you aren't pruning enough to do any dwarfing. We have removed whole limbs.

DR. McKAY: It may have different effects. We actually removed wood from the tree.

DR. McKAY: It is a smaller nut. The 7916 is a potentially high bearer. It bears quickly after it is planted and that is one of the things a lot of us are interested in.

Our preliminary conclusion is that early pruning in this species causes severe dwarfing and delay in the fruiting of Chinese chestnuts. Just let them alone. Plant them and forget about pruning them until they come into bearing. Let them alone and you will get nuts two or three years sooner than if you start taking those lower limbs off. Once you get it into bearing then start in and take off a few limbs on the bottom. You could still over-do the thing. The point is to wait at least three or four years. We will have some recommendations in another year when we shall know more ourselves.

DR. McKAY: We don't figure it is necessary to be too particular about painting the wounds. Those wounds heal over very quickly. Use an asphalt tree wound compound.

MR. SILVIS: Personally it appears to me that Walter Sherman's method of rubbing off the buds or very young shoots just as they start growth is to be preferred. Your method of cutting off limbs is destructive pruning. Though you say pruning dwarfs the tree, actually the root is still there and given enough time will not the tree recover?

DR. CRANE: I carried on pruning experiments for many, many years, with apples, peaches, pears and cherries. Since then I have been working on nut trees. As for this debudding, the reason he doesn't know he was injuring, was that he didn't have checks and experiments. When you have, you will see that debudding or even pinching the terminals will actually dwarf the tree, although not as badly if it is not done in the summer time. If you do it in the springtime, and if you keep on debudding along in June and July, you are dwarfing your trees.

MR. McDANIEL: In the University orchard you will see some Chinese chestnuts which have been pruned heavily, and the results aren't good.

MR. CORSAN: I visited a sweet chestnut orchard in Michigan, and the grower told me that there were two types of Chinese chestnut trees, one that grew tall and the other squatty. The one that grew shorter was much later than the tall one. Then I would like to tell you about an experience I had years ago. I imported from this state of Illinois from Miss Amelia Riehl, and I also planted about a bushel of seed of Chinese chestnut trees grown in the Niagara district. These Niagara seedlings are quite large and the amazing thing is they didn't grow any nuts. So I came across another orchard in the Niagara district where they were growing that large pointed type of nut and I got some grafts from that and I put them on these non-bearing trees and they all took at once. A bunch of them would all grow up without any failure. That was easy and now they are growing fine. I just thought I would tell you that peculiar experience, and that knocked me cold. The trees from Illinois and the trees from the seeds of the large good sized nuts were equally good.

MR. CORSAN: They sent out sprouts that far. [Indicating.] The trees were all right.

MR. STOKE: I think you are both wrong. I think you will take the tree and plant it without pruning and then it starts and then in the summer after it is in full leaf pinch off the leader in the lower branches. That will retain the value of those lower leaves. By doing that and suppressing the lower you will get better results than either of the other ways. Nature will remove and make unfruitful the lower ones. You can help nature in forcing the upper growth and removing the lower.

DR. McKAY: That is one way of doing it. A lot of people want to get ahead of nature. If you wait for those lower limbs to die, the tree will have to be pretty large. Lots of people want to get under their trees before that. You sometimes want to get there after three or four years. I think it would take ten years for the shade to do it.

MR. STOKE: I didn't mean to let the shade do it. We after three or four years can remove the limbs ourselves with less shock and much better results. That will work on any tree.

DR. CRANE: That may be true. We have seen very conclusively that when you prune even a little you are going to destroy fruiting.

MR. STOKE: You will have a larger tree in five years by my method than by yours.

MR. A. M. WHITFORD: I have trees of that very spreading type of Chinese chestnut, that are lying on the ground and I should have removed those limbs five or eight years ago. You should remove them in not more than five years after planting.

DR. McKAY: I want to make a comment. Some grafted trees are not bearing. This to us shows the importance of varieties. This difference between 7916 and the two others is so striking it means in the future we have to pay more attention to the varieties. There is no question that some varieties will bear sooner than others. We have to talk about grafted trees because that is the only thing that can be developed. Every grafted tree is potentially like every other of the same variety.

MEMBER: What factors suppress them? In pinching back, do you mean that the actual growth rate is changed, or that debudding will suppress the entire tree?

DR. McKAY: We mean the amount of the top itself. Usually it is the spread and the height together. When you prune, you tend to hold back the total amount of the fruiting area of the tree. If you allow it to develop untouched you have a greater fruiting area.

MEMBER: The chestnut tree often will sprout from the trunk. What are the processes to check that?

DR. CRANE: It is very largely root pressure. When you have a tree that is uninjured, all of your water and soluble minerals are going up to the top. When you have the tree trunk killed or cut off you still have water in your root system. In some trees you have a lot of adventitious buds that are still there and never forced out. Nitrogen will force those dormant buds into growth. At each walnut node or leaf we have as many as seven buds, all of which are capable of producing growth. Normally it is only the major bud that grows, but propagators sometimes get a patch bud back to life even though the primary bud dries up. Keep on forcing it and you are bound to get a sprout out of that bud. That is just the way it is with a lot of dormant buds. There are so many that when we cut off the top these dormant buds are forced into growth. Some trees don't have them. Tung does not form dormant buds, but will form those adventitious buds. They will form numerous buds even in a very small area of callus. It is just a safeguard that some plants have developed to keep the individuals alive.

MR. McDANIEL: I think what Mr. Craig had in mind was the tendency there is in Chinese chestnut to form multiple trunks.

DR. CRANE: That is due to these dormant buds and the ability to produce callus. Chestnut is one of the species that produces abundant callus very readily. That is one of the reasons this Chinese chestnut is so blight resistant. When it has an injury it will form callus at the point of the injury.

MEMBER: Would you tell me how you would start a blind bud growing. It will not break. It doesn't form. When I come to a wood which is blind I cut it off.

MR. CHASE: We have had such buds and find if that bud is blind you can force all you want to but you won't get any new buds to grow from that bud patch.

DR. McKAY: It does on two-year wood. Perhaps on one-year wood you have no adventitious buds. When the bud dies, that patch is through. On two-year wood frequently small adventitious buds will grow.

DR. McKAY: We recommend one year if it is large and vigorous. If you have to use chestnut wood smaller than a pencil the results will be indifferent.

DR. McKAY: We graft in spring, the first week in May, using dormant wood the size of your little finger. We wait until the first leaves are open, usually in May.

MEMBER: Do I understand that most any place along that tree trunk there are adventitious buds?

DR. McKAY: We have had some success and other times failures. We can't recommend bench grafting. Perhaps you can do it, but we haven't yet worked out a satisfactory method.

MR. CORSAN: In New York they had weevils. That is the most terrible thing I ever saw. Has the weevil disappeared entirely?

MEMBER: No, indeed, we have weevils over a large area. It is a very important pest in the East and in the Ozark Chinkapin range around chestnut plantings. There is a very satisfactory and easy way of control. DDT, two pounds per 100 gallons of spray solution or a dust of one per cent. The trees are sprayed once or twice or three times from about the last of August on until shortly before harvest.

MR. CORSAN: I fumigated my seed nuts for the weevils and killed them all effectively, and we have no weevils of hickory or chestnuts now. That is, as far as southern Canada is concerned. It would matter terribly if we had any weevils of any kind. Anyone hear about the hickory and chestnut weevil?

MEMBER: Standard directions are available for the control of weevils both in chestnut and hickories.

MEMBER: There are practically no weevils in New York. The boundary line would be about southern New Jersey. It doesn't make much progress farther north. It's also absent toward the Southeastern and Gulf coasts.

DR. ROHRBACHER: I am sure your project is interesting, manifested by the questions you have been asked.

FOOTNOTES:

[2] Horticulturist and Principal Horticulturist, respectively. U. S. Department of Agriculture, Bureau Plant Industry, Soils and Agricultural Engineering, Beltsville, Md.

[3] Number in parenthesis refer to literature cited, p. 25.

The Filbert and Persian Walnut in Indiana

The native hazelnut thickets are not as common now as in years past. Most of the nuts were small and of little commercial value. When hybridizers and other nut enthusiasts started improving the size and quality of the native hazelnut and bringing in filberts from other countries, some impetus was added to the filbert planting program. Only a few took advantage of these new and promising seedlings, and aside from a few small plantings throughout the state the filbert is placed in the ornamental grouping of plants. Several areas in Indiana are suitable for more extensive plantings. The Jones hybrids have proven satisfactory and are found growing from the northern part to the Ohio River.

Several crosses were made four years ago using pollen from the Rush and large fruited seedlings on the native hazel. There are 35 or 40 such plants, two years old, now growing in the Purdue plot. They came through the winter in excellent condition. Many of the catkins on the older plants were killed during the early cold spell, and the nut crop this year is very spotty. The filbert does have a place around the home as an ornamental, as a fruit tree, or when used as a hedge for screening.

The Carpathian Persian Walnut

The Carpathian Persian walnuts in Indiana are practically all seedlings. Many of these seedling trees show great promise, while others under observation for the past few years are being discarded because of lack of hardiness and production. Some few seedlings made vigorous growth and produced fair to good yields for the past 10 years, but some weakness was evident after the 1950-51 winter. It appears now that those trees that have survived and are in production this year are worthy of further study and propagation.

The oldest known Persian walnut in our state is the Haderle seedling. A few nuts, from a friend in California, were planted in 1924 and 10 years later fruited. This tree has produced as many as 350 pounds of nuts in a single year and has survived all test winters since planting. The nut from the Haderle tree averages 32 nuts per pound, medium shell, good quality and 44.6 per cent of the total weight is edible. The nut cracks well. Several other such Persian seedlings have been classified as existing prior to the general distribution of Carpathian nuts from the Wisconsin Horticultural Society in 1936 to 1938 and later.

Several individuals in Indiana took advantage of the nut sale and importation from Poland during the years mentioned and about 10 per cent of the original seedlings are now alive. Many of the trees planted 10 to 15 years ago are fruiting and classified. Outstanding groups of seedlings, which are referred to by name, such as Bolten, Fateley, Eagles, Barnhart, Kraning, Behr, Zollman, and others are found from the extreme northern area to the Ohio River, and are distributed over nearly one-half of the 92 counties in Indiana.

The use of eastern black walnut as understock has been practised by several orchardists and nurserymen, and a few will have trees for sale in the near future. The fruits from these trees compare with the best.

The largest nut is in the Fateley #1., with some fruits two inches in diameter, and averaging 23 nuts per pound. The nut is high in quality, has an appealing taste, and a well formed kernel. It cracks easily and has a very thin shell for such a large nut. This tree has borne 50 pounds of nuts or more annually for the past few years and has a nice crop this year after the severe test winter. The Fateley #1 seedling as well as the #2, #3 and #4 seedlings, are grown on a city lot, under crowded conditions and provided with only moderate care.

Several crosses have been made at Purdue with the Persian walnut, and approximately 100 seedlings have been distributed to various persons throughout a large area of the state. The trees do not seem as susceptible to insect and disease damage as the native black walnut, and growing well in sod should make good lawn trees. Some of the nut trees were sprayed with "Nu Green"—five pounds per 100 gallons of spray material was used on the orchard crops, and great growth response was noted for the sprayed over unsprayed trees. As the home owner is forever looking for new trees to plant, and trees with clean habits, the Persian and particularly the Carpathian selections may be the answer.

The speaker exhibited photographs to illustrate his talk. They pictured several of the different trees he had mentioned. The photographs showed the conditions under which the trees grew, the effects of fertilizing, and the injuries resulting from the winter cold. The reading of the paper was followed by a short discussion, after which Dr. Rohrbacher called upon Mr. Ira Kyhl, of Sabula, Iowa, who talked on the subject "Nut Growing in Eastern Iowa."

Nut Growing in Eastern Iowa

In top working, I use the bark slot method, usually setting two to three grafts on a three inch stock, as at least one scion is almost sure to start. These scions are fitted and nailed in place with a seven-eighth or one inch nail and then well wrapped with one-inch industrial adhesive tape. This seems to break or deteriorate with the growth of the graft. I then thoroughly wax the taped part as well as all of the scion, covering the buds rather lightly. After the scion has started to grow well, a one by one strip is nailed to the stock. This extends from two to three feet above the top of the stock. The growth is then tied to the stick with soft cord. If growths are not tied this way, most of them are broken off by the wind. After the grafts are set, I cover with a paper milk bottle, or rather, container, and cut four small holes in it for ventilation. It sheds the rain well. I use a small tack on two sides. The containers usually stay there until removed when the graft starts. This method works much better than paper bags, as they are easily water-soaked and the wind blows them against the scion, which is easily loosened and therefore fails to start.

I am also well pleased with the results I have had with heartnuts on black walnuts. I consider them the most rapid-growing of any of the nut trees. I have had grafts bear a few nuts the next year after being set. I now have seven or eight varieties, of which I consider Fodermaier, Aloka, Rival, Mitchell, and Wright as the most promising, along with Goettler. Squirrels seem to prefer heartnuts to all other sorts. I have eliminated this trouble by tacking a length or two of stove pipe around the trees.

Last summer my attention was called to a tree about 30 miles from my home, which bore a very large crop of heartnuts. The man that owned the tree called them filberts. The tree is about 40 feet tall with a spread of 40 or 50 feet and is 18 inches in diameter. It is perhaps 20 to 25 years old and bears from three to four bushels a year, I am told. I have heard that the tree grew from a seed brought over from Germany. I have named the tree Goettler, in honor of the man bringing it to my attention. The nut seems to resemble the Wright and is one of the best cracking nuts I have found. I received permission to get scion wood from the tree and have a few grafts growing well.

Hickories are, of course, a native of this section as is pecan, which grows wild on the Mississippi River bottoms about as far north as the mouth of the Maquoketa River. The pecan grafts take off nicely on hickory stocks but the graft seems to outgrow the stock. I have found, however, that hican, being half hickory and half pecan, works much better on a hickory stock. My pecan grafts which seem the most promising are Major, Indiana and Greenriver, and of the hican grafts the Burlington and Wapello.

Chestnuts seem to do very well here, as well as filberts and native hazels. Of the chestnut varieties I have growing I prefer the Nanking, Kuling and Meiling. Most of my Persian walnut plantings I have interplanted with dwarf fruit trees and have clover and alfalfa growing between the rows. This is cut twice a year and used for mulch. The following spring it is spaded in and a small amount of high test nitrogen applied at the same time and the trees all seem to respond to this treatment very well.

MEMBER: Mr. Kyhl mentioned the Schafer. That is the one for the boys and girls in a hurry to get nuts. In three years you get nuts. I have experimented with it and that is the only tree that will do it.

MR. CORSAN: I would like to ask the convention if they have had the experience with the black walnut and the Persian. Down the valley would come a good strong wind and break off the tops. I had one that grew 20 feet from a little graft. When I put this on, it had three buds. One bud threw six feet and 20 feet of wood from that one seeding. I barricaded it so the ice wouldn't break it. The ice broke through my barricade and I have one that is growing as high as I can reach. Black walnut broke off with the wind. Sometime, the whole tree broke down. Not a twig was broken off the English walnut. The black walnuts worry me to pieces.

MR. DAVIDSON: In connection with this rapid growth, is there any difference in the quality of the wood? We have some that grow so much more rapidly. When the wood matures, will it have the same value for furniture and so on as the slower growing ones? Would they be more like the softwood?

MR. CRANE: Our highest grade native woods are those which grow more slowly. We haven't made any studies on the wood in black walnut, in relation to the growth rate.

DR. MacDANIELS: The strength and value of the wood depends on the proportion of large and small cells. In a very slow-growing tree you have a large proportion of the big cells. In rapid-growing wood you also have an undesirable result. It is between the very slow and very rapid that you get the best. If you get a rapid growth the cells are thin, even though they may be small. It is the in-between condition that makes for good timber. That is based on actual strength tests and evaluation.

MEMBER: Mr. Corsan wrote me about the wind damage. I never had that experience. I saw the cyclone in southeastern Iowa. Elms were up-rooted and torn to pieces and I didn't see any black walnut damage. Even the hickories were damaged and some snapped off. I have never seen any walnut give away.

MR. McDANIEL: We have wind damage in Urbana, and we can show you some places where black walnut trees were removed.

MR. CORSAN: Many years ago I was in a train going from Toronto to Montreal, and this is a section that is full of hickory trees. The Indians must have planted them. That is the only nut except butternut. I looked out the window and we had a six-inch ice storm and the oaks were stripped. Most of the other soft trees were down to the ground. There wasn't even a twig killed on the hickories. The shagbark hickory. They were just as sound.

DR. ROHRBACHER: The ladies who want to take a little walk and end up at Mrs. Colby's home where she is going to serve hot coffee meet at 1.30 in the main lobby. This is the regular time on which you are eating and sleeping now. The remainder of the group will meet here at one o'clock. If we go down to the cafeteria and get in before 11:40 we have a better chance.

FOOTNOTES:

[4] Now named Colby, this variety is a seedling of Crath No. 10.—ED.

TUESDAY AFTERNOON SESSION

MR. McDANIEL: By count last Saturday, we had 568 paid members plus 21 subscribers—a total of 589, compared with 575 members and a total list of 596 a year ago and 653 in 1949. Maybe you need a new secretary who is a more successful salesman, to push the membership higher. Actually we still have more members than at any time before the late 1940's, but we need more salesmanship to double or triple the present number. The planting of hardy named nut trees is going up by leaps and bounds (ask any nut nurseryman) but membership in the leading organization to promote their culture is lagging. We need more members among the new nut planters, and I think we have plenty to offer them for their $3.00, but we are not getting the point over to enough of them. There are thousands that we helped to get started. If anyone has some new ideas on the subject, let him speak up in the discussion period, and we will try to put the ideas into operation if they don't cost too much—in money or time of the organization's officers.

Ohio still has the most members, and I think we can say the Ohio group is the most closely knit and active one in any state at present. There are 82 members in Ohio now. Several of them are new ones. Ohio is keeping up its membership percentage and it is always well represented at the meeting. How many here from Ohio today? Not quite half the group.

It is nip and tuck between New York and Pennsylvania for membership down through the years. This year Pennsylvania is one man ahead of New York, unless George Salzer has brought another new member's name with him. Pennsylvania is 58, New York 57. Two years ago it was New York 62, Pennsylvania 57. Then we had the meeting in New York state last year. Maybe some of the New Yorkers took a good look at us and decided it wasn't the crowd they wanted to be associated with! We haven't met in Pennsylvania recently, so the membership there is very steady. Dr. Colwell moved back home from Ecuador, so Pennsylvania moves from 57 to 58 members.

Will the members from these two states rise briefly? Pennsylvania first—at least three from Pennsylvania; then New York—three from New York State.

I might say the decline in New York members is not in the Rochester area. Mr. Salzer is seeing to it that they don't drop out in Western New York. A lady in his county won our $25.00 first prize for her Persian walnut, and George relieved her of $3.00 of it for 1952 dues. We need more members like Mr. Salzer, and Mrs. Metcalfe, too.

Illinois is fourth now with 38 members. I don't know what it'll drop to after this meeting. One member changed his address from Chicago to Indiana, but we are still seven up from the 31 of two years ago. Maybe Illinois is going to become a nut growing state after all, in spite of oak wilt, walnut bunch, spittle bugs, and the 1950 Thanksgiving freeze.

Will the Illinois people rise, both members and visitors? Not quite a fourth of the group is from Illinois.

Michigan is still fifth—32 members now, 30 in 1949. Take a bow, all you Michiganders—five or six from Michigan. We could afford to take a chance on a meeting there again before long.

Indiana is going up slowly in membership. It is now sixth with 27, supplanting Tennessee. It had 18 members in 1947 and 25 in 1949. How many Hoosiers here? Six or seven from Indiana.

Canada has 26 members listed now, putting it seventh. (There were 26 in 1949 also). Who's here from Canada—at least two.

Iowa is one of only two other states with more than 20 members, having 22 in the book now, compared with 26 two years ago and 30 in 1947. How many Iowans here?—three besides our President.

New Jersey has 21, Massachusetts has 17, Tennessee has 16, Virginia and Washington 14 each, Missouri, 13, California and Maryland 12 each, Connecticut and Oklahoma, 11 each, Kentucky and Kansas 10 each, West Virginia 8 and Georgia 5. There are fewer than five each in all the other states, except seven states with no members. Arkansas is a good nut producing state, but membership dropped from four to none. There are no members and seldom have been in Arizona, Colorado,[5] Maine, Montana, Nevada, and Wyoming. I believe we never had one in either Arizona or Nevada, but the others have occasionally had one.

Hong Kong is a new territory on our list of foreign members, though Mr. Wang, who now lives there, joined the NNGA from China around 30 years ago.

We are a little better off on the annual report now than we were a year ago. It is printed and members who are here can take their copies. The story is the same as usual with the printers, although they are new ones this time. Our job got behind some others which moved slowly and then was put aside for work on school annuals in which this company does a lot of business. With some more volunteer editorial assistants and proof readers maybe we can get the copy to the printers earlier, so as really to get the book printed in the winter I agree with all the members who said that a year between the meeting and the publication is too long.

Looking toward this the November 1 cut-off for accepting papers should still apply, with the suggested addition that no long ones will be accepted which were not read at the meeting. Composition is too expensive to permit publication of a book with unnecessary wordage, so I hope we can avoid as much as possible the duplication of material which appeared in recent reports. Boil it down, and please, for the sake of the editor's eyesight, don't try to put too much on a page. The editors appreciate some space between the lines. But if you have something new to report, don't hesitate to send it in.

The 1950 report is here. I think it's a good one. In the hope of having a still better one for this meeting, I'll stop now.

DR. ROHRBACHER: Thank you for your report. Any discussion and criticism both destructive and constructive?

MEMBER: I thought this 1951 circular of information was a handy thing to have. I was wondering if more are available.

MR. McDANIEL: Yes, we run off a surplus each year and any member may have more upon request.

MEMBER: If you were to mail two instead of one to each member, that member could give the extra copy to a prospective member.

MEMBER: I would like to make a suggestion on that card business. Why not follow the system of the National Geographic's recommendation card—you can't become a Geographic Society member any other way.

MR. McDANIEL: We will put a card or blank for nominations of members in the next issue of the Nutshell.

DR. ROHRBACHER: This is the time the secretary would like to have comments on this to give him help if he gets his job back.

MEMBER: It seems to me it would be a help in not only attracting new members but a help in stimulating attendance in our meetings if the annual report of the preceeding meeting could be gotten out something like two months ahead of the following meeting.

MR. DAVIDSON: I do think it has quite an influence in stimulating interest not only on the part of our members but stimulating attendance at our meeting. I do think also that the suggestion of following the example of the National Geographic should be put in the form of a motion and the Secretary instructed to remind each member to please nominate his or her friends for membership in the Association. I would be glad to make that motion.

DR. ROHRBACHER: Do I hear it seconded? (Motion seconded). It has been moved by Mr. Davidson and seconded by Mr. Wallick from Indiana that we carry through this new project of securing membership. Any further discussion?

MR. DAVIDSON: I would move then that the secretary be instructed to send to each member a reminder of his duty to nominate friends for membership in this Association.

MR. McDANIEL: Members first, officers later. If you stay a member long enough you probably get to be an officer.

MEMBER: I'd like to amend that resolution that the secretary send a card to each member in which he can nominate a new member. With the secretary just reminding the members nothing ever happens. I think the card has to go with the reminder.

MEMBER: I think this whole thing clarifies itself if you bear in mind that the application form and the nomination are one and the same thing. A card which says in effect "I apply for membership in the NNGA" and the blank for his name, occupation and address. The card says that remittance of the annual dues is made herewith and this applicant has been nominated by the current member of the Association. It is one card. I receive a couple of these from the secretary and write my name for a nominee. His name and address and that is sent in to the treasurer together with his dues and an application of someone who has been nominated. It is a good screening because you have people interested definitely in the work of this organization.

MEMBER: I would fear that too many barriers put in the way of it might tend to decrease the number of new members. It is hard enough to get people interested.

MEMBER: Mr. President, I don't see how that can be a barrier since one doesn't know unless a member tells him. One doesn't become a member until a member said "Look, you should belong, let me nominate you for membership."

MEMBER: The National Geographic psychology is good. They have a circulation of one million, seven hundred thousand. If you want the National Geographic, some member has to sign a card. The psychology of that is that it makes it a little hard to get in and it works.

Is there anything further to take up under the heading of helping our secretary? If not, we will go on and have a report from our treasurer.

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