President Morris: Let us hear from Mr. Roper.

Mr. Roper: I don't think I know much about the Indiana pecan trees, except what we have been doing in Virginia with them. I have discussed some of the results in the paper on pecan trees for planting in the North.

President Morris: Committee appointments are as follows: Committee on Competition, Messrs. Reed, Littlepage, and myself, ex-officio. Committee on General Exhibits, Messrs. Barron and Roper. Committee on Resolutions, Messrs. Reed, Littlepage, and Schempp. Committee on Membership, Messrs. Deming, Lake, and Rush. Nominating Committee, Professor Craig and Col. Van Duzee.

Professor Lake: Does that complete all the committees?

President Morris: That is all on the list here.

Professor Lake: I would like to suggest one, because I think it will materially help the matter of bringing the nut subject before the people in an effective manner,—a committee on score card. That is at the basis of competitions, and when the nut grower gets acquainted with the score card, and knows that is going to be the basis of judging the competitions, he knows there is going to be something doing.

President Morris: That is a rather important point. I would like to have the matter discussed.

Professor Craig: I think the idea is an excellent one. There is no way in which we can analyze the qualities of fruit better than by having a systematic method of discussing its different characters. The score card does that,—separates each one and makes them stand for what they are worth. In order to unify methods of judging used by the different societies, a score card which this society might develop and recommend would be a very valuable thing as a guide for nut growers here in the Northeast. The National Nut Growers' Association has a score card for pecans, and a score card has been recommended by the Department of Agriculture. I am not sure that score cards have been provided for the Persian walnut and for the hickories, and our northern types. I think Mr. Lake's suggestion is entirely in order and well worthy of consideration.

President Morris: It appeals to me at once. I think we would put Mr. Lake and Professor Craig on a score card committee.

Professor Craig: I think a score card can be presented, subject to revision, which will answer the present demand.

FRIDAY MORNING, DECEMBER 15, 1911.

President Morris: The meeting is called to order. The Secretary will read the proposed amendments to the constitution. I believe there is no provision in the by-laws for making such amendment. I don't know what the customary rule is in the matter. I presume we could submit it to a vote.

Doctor Deming: Under the heading "Committees," the following is proposed: "The Association shall appoint standing committees of three members each to consider and report on the following topics at each annual meeting: first, on promising seedlings; second, on nomenclature; third, on hybrids; fourth, on membership; fifth, on press and publication."

Professor Craig: I move the adoption of this amendment to our constitution. (Seconded. Carried.)

Doctor Deming: Under the head of "Meetings," the amendment is as follows: "The Association shall hold an annual meeting, to be held at the time and place to be selected by the Executive Committee."

Professor Lake: Some way or another, I feel that I oppose that attitude. I believe a delegate will often go to a convention with the idea of presenting views upon holding it at some specific place. It seems to me we ought to give the annual meeting an opportunity to designate the place of meeting. Some people say they will pack a convention. If they are sufficiently enthusiastic to pack a convention they are entitled to have the meeting. I have heard an expression from one or two members that they would like to see it at a certain place. It is true they can present their views to the Executive Committee, but if the Executive Committee is not present at this place, it is necessary for them to make another trip, or appeal to them by correspondence. I would like to have that put in such a way that the annual meeting might select the place of meeting.

President Morris: It is a matter for consideration. Is there any further discussion on this point?

Doctor Deming: It seems to me that the question of the selection of the meeting place is a matter for very deliberate consideration, and it isn't always that a question of this kind will get deliberate consideration in a meeting which acts very often without considering all sides of the question. It seems to me that, while it would be advisable to have the place of the next meeting discussed by the Association as a whole, the decision as to the place of meeting might very safely be left to the Executive Committee.

Mr. Littlepage: I think, as a general rule, it is pretty wise to give some latitude in these matters, for the reason that conditions may develop from time to time which make it desirable to have some flexibility as to the place of meeting. I think, especially with the able Executive Committee we now have, it could safely be left to the Executive Committee.

Professor Craig: Since Professor Lake has spoken, I have a good deal of sympathy with his attitude, and I am rather inclined to think it would be wise to modify that clause in such a way as to give the meeting the privilege, in case there was an overwhelming element in favor of a certain place, of selecting the next place for the convention; and I would suggest a modification of that clause to this effect, that the place of meeting shall be selected at the annual meeting, or by the Executive Committee subsequently thereto. That would give the membership an opportunity of having a word in it, and would open the door so that it could be considered at the annual meeting; but in the event of this not taking place then, it would fall to the Executive Committee to select the meeting place. I move that as an amendment to the proposed clause.

Professor Lake: I support Professor Craig's motion.

Professor Craig: If my seconder will approve, I will offer that as a substitute instead of an amendment.

Professor Lake: I accept it. (Carried.)

Doctor Deming: Under the head of "Officers," the following amendment is proposed: "There shall be a president, a vice-president, a secretary-treasurer, and an executive committee of five persons, of which latter the president, vice-president, and secretary shall be members, and a vice-president from each state represented in the membership of the Association."

Professor Lake: I move that the clause be accepted.

Mr. Rush: I second the motion. (Carried.)

Doctor Deming: Under the heading of "Election of Officers," this addition is proposed: "The President shall appoint a nominating committee of three persons at the annual meeting, whose duty it shall be to report to the meeting a list of officers for the ensuing year."

Professor Lake: I don't want to be an objector. I simply want to file a protest against this method of election in an organization, on general principles. I am opposed to anything that looks like continuing an administration. This doesn't give an opportunity for election from the floor. It might be so amended, that an annual meeting may elect from the floor. I am thoroughly in sympathy with popular government. I have seen a good deal of this, and I would like to get away from the sentiment of anything of that kind by allowing nominations from the floor.

Doctor Deming: How would it be if the nominating committee, instead of being appointed by the President, were appointed in some elective way by the meeting as a whole?

Professor Lake: I accept Doctor Deming's suggestion. That is a most excellent way of eliminating both sides of the controversy. I would like to put that definitely into form, that we have a committee of five,—that is sufficient for the present,—that a committee of five be elected at the annual meeting for the purpose of nominating officers for the subsequent year. I put that as a motion.

Mr. Rush: I second that motion. (Carried.)

President Morris: The committee for the nomination of new officers will consist of Professor Craig and Colonel Van Duzee. This other committee of five, as I understand it, is not to be appointed now.

Doctor Deming: The only thing that I have now is the proposition that we honor Mr. Henry Hales by electing him an honorary member of the Association. I would like to move that Mr. Henry Hales of Ridgewood, New Jersey, be elected an honorary member of this Association.

Mr. Littlepage: I second that motion. (Carried.)

President Morris: On the competition, the committee consisted of Mr. Reed, Mr. Littlepage, and myself. Mr. Littlepage has specimens in for competition, and I will appoint Mr. Roper in his place. The next order of business will be the paper on experiences in propagation, by Professor Close.

THE BENCH ROOT-GRAFTING OF PERSIAN WALNUTS AND PECANS.

The grafts which were placed in the greenhouse gave pretty good results as shown by the following data given respectively under the headings "Earth Bed" and "Decayed Sawdust."

EARTH BED.

DECAYED SAWDUST.

These figures show that 61 per cent of those in the earth bed and 65 per cent of those in the decayed sawdust, were alive when they were taken up early in May. Some had made a growth of from two to eight inches and were fine little trees. Most of these transplanted grafts were set in nursery rows and nearly all succumbed to the extreme drought of the season.

CONCLUSIONS.

The season was so extremely dry that the practice of planting root grafts as soon as made did not prove successful. However, work done in other years indicated that in normal seasons this may be done with considerable success. Placing the grafts in a greenhouse either in earth or decayed sawdust gave encouraging results, but when transplanted in the nursery the grafts could not withstand the unusually dry and hot weather. The black walnut proved to be the best stock for the Persian walnut and two buds to the cion are required. Grafting wax should not be used if the union of cion and stock is to be covered with earth; this point was clearly proven in previous years.

Prof. Close performed considerable work in topgrafting and budding on three and four year old stocks. The top grafts were a failure. The buds survived, and were in good, strong condition October fifteenth. That was on Persian walnut and pecan, about half and half.

Mr. Pomeroy: Did he bud on black walnut stock?

Professor Lake: Yes. It was a little higher than a man, and had been cut back to about three feet. The crown grafting was fairly successful, but would have been much more successful, had they used something to cover the grafts.

Mr. Pomeroy: How long should the paper sack be left?

Professor Lake: It would vary with the season and activity of the stock, ten days to two weeks.

President Morris: I wish you would try further experiments in rooting scions in warm sand in the hot-house. I believe that in some stage you can probably root those cuttings in moist sand in the hot-house, heated beneath; and if you can do that, it is going to settle the question very largely of hickory and walnut propagation. What do you think about that, Professor Craig?

Professor Craig: I am not very optimistic about the possibility of that. I find it very, very difficult to get roots to develop from Hicoria. You can get the callus almost every time, but it is very difficult to secure the development of roots afterwards.

President Morris: How about getting callus by three months, we will say, in storage?

Professor Craig: We would have the same trouble. They would develop adventitious buds very poorly. Doctor Morris has sent us from time to time some samples, and we have been making experiments. I have used different methods and different propagators. We have one propagator, who has been most successful usually in striking difficult things, and he has absolutely failed in this one. I may say that our facilities for propagation are not ideal at the present time, but we shall have in a short time a good propagating house with properly regulated benches, as to bottom heat and overhead ventilation and all that; and we shall, of course, keep up the experiments.

President Morris: In my experiments, I grafted hickory scions on hickory roots, and the whole thing, root and scion, lived until the root sent out adventitious buds, yet in that case we did not get union between the top and the stock. How do you explain that, Professor Craig?

Professor Craig: I don't explain it.

President Morris: Are we likely to have success along that line by some modification of the plan?

Professor Craig: I couldn't say. You can keep the cuttings alive for three or four months.

President Morris: They were in damp rooms, exposed to light, right in the window.

Doctor Deming: Professor Coville has made some experiments in rooting hickory cuttings for me. Professor Coville is the one who has made such a success of blueberry culture. I sent him some cuttings, and he reports as follows:

"Two experiments were tried with the hickory cuttings received from Dr. W. C. Deming on January 5, 1911. In one experiment some of the cuttings were placed in a glass cutting bed in live sphagnum covered with sand, the upper ends of the cuttings projecting from the sand. The atmosphere above the cutting bed was kept in a state of saturation by a covering of glass. The bed was kept shaded and was subjected to an ordinary living room temperature varying from about 55° to 70°, or occasionally a few degrees higher.

On January 11 the cambium ring at the lower end of the cuttings had begun to callus. On February 17 the upper bud on one of the cuttings began to push. Later some of the other cuttings began to swell preparatory to the development of new growth. All the cuttings, however, finally died. It appeared from their behavior that the temperatures to which they were subjected were too high for their best development.

In the other experiment the cuttings were placed in sand without sphagnum in a greenhouse at a temperature ordinarily of 50° to 65°, rising occasionally, however, on still, sunny days to 70°. After a few weeks, these cuttings were well callused and the buds began to swell slowly, exposing first their green bracts, and later on some of the cuttings the green compound leaves, pushing out from among the bracts. These cuttings also, however, finally turned black and died, but not until after the first of April.

The experiments showed that hickory cuttings, when taken at a suitable time of year and exposed to conditions suited to other hard wooded plants known to be difficult to root, retained their vitality and passed satisfactorily through the stages preliminary to rooting. While no actual roots were secured, the experiments suggest that the rooting of hickory cuttings is not beyond the possibility of attainment.

As the basis of an experiment this winter, I suggest that you select half a dozen twigs that you are willing to sacrifice on some good variety of hickory, and remove a ring of bark at a distance of 4 to 8 inches from the top. The ring of bark removed should be about half an inch in length and its upper end should come about a quarter of an inch below a bud. At the present season the bark will not peel from the wood. It will, therefore, be necessary to scrape it off, so as to leave nothing but the wood on the girdled area. The bark should be cleanly cut at each end of this area. I hope that we shall still have sufficient warm weather to induce the formation of a callus on the cambium at the upper end of this ring.

Later in the winter, some time in January, you can cut off these twigs and send them to me, packed as those were last year. The cutting is preferably made just below the ring. I would prefer that all the wood from the ring to the tip of the twig be of the past summer's growth. We can try, however, twigs containing two seasons' growth, if the others are not easily available."

President Morris: That is a suggestion, you see, of apparent value, because it has succeeded with blueberries,—this method of cutting off a ring of bark before the leaves are shed, allowing a ring to callous, then later cutting off this prepared twig and subjecting it to methods for striking roots. It is an extremely interesting suggestion. Just as soon as I heard of this procedure, I went out and prepared about fifty hickory and walnut twigs myself, but that was this autumn, and I haven't cut them yet for the experiments in rooting. Has anyone had experience along this line?

Mr. Collins: I saw an experiment in rooting, and I am prompted to ask if anything has been done along this particular line. The method employed was this. The twig was partially cut from the branch, perhaps cut three-quarters of the way through with a slanting cut. It was then bent a little, and a little sphagnum put in the cut, then a ball of sphagnum was wrapped about the whole cut area, and it was tied with twine, and that was kept wet for several months, I think, until, finally, new roots pushed through and appeared on the outside of this ball of sphagnum.

President Morris: I read of that. It was published in a government report.

Professor Collins: It was on the rubber plant.

President Morris: I tried it at that time on the hickory. The difficulty was in getting my men sufficiently interested to keep the sphagnum wet all the time. It promised something. The rubber plants, perhaps, would lend themselves more readily to such a procedure than the hickories, because most of the rubber plants are air plants, anyway. All of the Ficus family depend so little upon the ground for their nourishment.

Professor Collins: I have seen that worked very successfully.

Professor Lake: You don't know how successful the callousing has been?

President Morris: They calloused all right.

Professor Lake: How long did it require?

President Morris: I don't remember. It was a good while, longer than I anticipated. I don't think there was a callus on the hickory in less than thirty days. The butternut and black walnut hardly showed any callus at all after keeping the sphagnum wet as long as my men would do it.

Professor Lake: At what time was the ringing done?

President Morris: The leaves had fallen this year. Professor Coville suggested that it be done before the leaves had fallen. But the hickory will callous after the leaves have fallen. It seems to me hickories are at work all winter long. They have a free flow of sap in January, and any warm day in January they will be like a maple tree, almost, if they are cut. I have grafted them at that time.

Mr. Brown: Can anyone give me any information on grafting chestnuts?

Mr. Rush: I have been very successful with the grafting of the chestnut. It is just as simple as grafting other fruit, except the Persian walnut. Tongue grafting and cleft grafting is very successful. There is no particular secret in connection with grafting chestnuts.

President Morris: Personally, I found it difficult for two or three years, but now I can graft the chestnut about as readily as I can graft the apple. There is no difference in methods. It seems to me from my present experience that one may graft or bud chestnut by almost any of the accepted methods pretty freely. What has been your experience, Mr. Littlepage?

Mr. Littlepage: I haven't been experimenting with the propagation of the chestnut yet. I am getting ready. I have three or four thousand seedlings, a few of which will be ready to graft next year. I have twenty acres of the Paragon chestnuts growing.

President Morris: In chestnut grafting, we will find that one kind does not graft or bud readily upon another kind, perhaps. For instance, there is some antagonism between the American sweet chestnut and Asiatic chestnuts. There is some antagonism between Asiatic and Europeans; there is little between Europeans and American sweet. These antagonisms are something that one has to learn from experience at the present time, because I doubt if we have had enough experience to know just where we stand on this question.

Professor Collins: Doesn't there seem to be antagonism between eastern Asiatic other than Japanese and Japanese?

President Morris: Yes; the Koreans of both kinds, the north Japanese of both kinds, and the Manchurian chestnut are the five that I have experimented with in grafting, and none of those grow so well on American stock as they should.

Professor Collins: I mean to say between the Korean and the Japanese.

President Morris: There is less antagonism. You can graft the Korean upon the Japanese and the Japanese upon the Korean very readily. They have very much the same texture of wood, the same character of buds and bark.

Professor Collins: Is there any antagonism between eastern Asian and Japanese?

President Morris: I don't know that my experience has been extensive enough to say. My men have put on perhaps two or three hundred grafts back and forth between these kinds, the customary accidents have happened, and we have about given up trying to do much grafting of Japanese on American, but still plan to graft Japanese back and forth upon each other, and we are now planning to graft European and American back and forth upon each other.

Mr. Brown: What about the position of the graft?

President Morris: I don't know, Mr. Brown, if there is very much difference. I haven't found very much. I have grafted all the way from the root to the top.

Mr. Rush: It is better on top. Sometimes the grafting has an effect upon the stock just at the union. If it is budded low, it blights. The bark gets loose. All those that are grafted high are doing remarkably well.

President Morris: The next on the list is Doctor Deming's paper on "Nut Promotions."

Doctor Deming: I will read first a communication from Mr. Henry Hales of Ridgewood, New Jersey.

HALES' PAPER SHELL HICKORY.

Those are the only trees successfully grafted, out of thousands done in the North outside, from which I am afraid grafting outside in the North is a failure on hickory stocks. There may be a better chance on pecan stock, which I have not thoroughly tested under favorable circumstances. I have been sending northern pecan nuts and had them planted, and sent scions for working on them in the South; had some failures from natural causes. Simpson Bros. of Monticello, Florida, have had fair success there. My share of two year old trees are on the way here. Of the value of these nuts too much cannot be said. Mr. Fuller ranked them superior to the Madeira nut. It has remarkable keeping qualities.

It has taken from eighteen to twenty-five years for my grafted trees to come into bearing.

I earnestly hope that with the knowledge gained so far, the means of propagation on a large scale will soon be discovered and successfully carried on. What a gain it would be to the wealth of our food production and luxury. The American hickory would then stand highest on the list of our native nuts.

President Morris: Are there any comments upon this paper of Mr. Hales? So much is being said about the Hales hickory, it seems to me that possibly we ought to put on record some thoughts in the matter. Mr. Hales is entitled to more credit than any other man for bringing forward the development of the shagbark hickory, and his enthusiasm was based upon this remarkable nut on his grounds. It is a very large nut, and, like all large nuts, is much coarser in character than small nuts, and, like all large nuts, lacks delicacy of flavor that we find in small nuts. It is thinner shelled than most of the shagbarks that we would see in many days spent in the woods, but when we have for comparison some smaller nuts, we find shells very much thinner than the shell of the Hales. The Hales, like many other large hickories, keeps much better than the small hickories of finer texture and more delicate quality, and it may be very good at three years of age, while some of the most delicious of the smaller, more tender and delicate nuts are spoiling at the end of six months. I don't know that Mr. Hales would take exception to my way of stating this, but it seems to me that he ought to feel that we give him all honor, that we think it a remarkable nut, that it is a nut, because of its size and features, worthy of the enthusiasm he gave it. There is apt to be some misunderstanding as to the exact position this holds in relation to other shagbark hickories.

Mr. Littlepage: What is its bearing record as to quantity?

President Morris: The tree has been cut so much for scions that it has never had a fair chance. It is a prolific tree. It is well worthy of propagation.

Mr. Littlepage: It is, perhaps,—judging from looking at it—a very fine shagbark for commercial purposes. Isn't it true that within the next ten years there will, in all probability, be a complete reversion in the mind of the nut culturist as to the kind and quality of the nut he will propagate. I will supplement that by saying that heretofore, both in the pecan and other nut fields, the whole tendency has been toward something big. Now, the wise fellows in the South today are beginning to get away from that. I have made many trips down there, and I find there is a very changing sentiment. I want to say that in my observation the future price of the various nuts of the country is going to be determined by the price of nut meat; that the meats are going to be put on the market, and while there will always be plenty of nuts marketed in the shell, the price of the nut meat will be the dominant factor. I was walking down G Street in Washington the other day with an ex-United States Senator, and ex-member of Congress, and an ex-Governor, and they passed a nut store, and saw in the window some nuts, also a big box of nut meats. Everyone went in, and all passed up the nuts and bought the nut meat. That expresses, to my notion, the tendency that is coming; and that thing is going, then, to determine very largely the question of quality.

President Morris: I think we certainly are going to have a complete change in ideas about raising nuts. We are going to raise big ones of the kinds where everybody will buy one pound and nobody will buy two pounds. We are going to raise nuts that will appeal to the people who purchase things in the open market, and who never in their lives get hold of anything that is good. We are going also to raise nuts that will appeal to connoisseurs, and that will be bought by people who know one work of art from another. In other words, we are going to make the progress in nut culture that has been made in other fields of horticulture. At the present time, if one could raise a pear as big as a watermelon and tasting like the rind, that would be the pear that would sell in the market. But the connoisseur buys the Seckel in place of it. When there is a pear like the Kieffer that will fill the top of the tree so there is no room for leaves and branches, the market men are going to raise that pear. But when we go into the market, we go around a block to escape the place where they sell the Kieffer pear, and we buy the Bartlett. We have precisely the same problems in nut culture.

Mr. Pomeroy: I have been thinking some on this line. I have spent a good many half hours in the last four or five years with an old German in Buffalo. He has a stand on one of the big markets. I find that he has a whole lot to say in regard to what the people buy. He has found this out, and he has been there a good many years. He says, "I have been getting black walnuts from the same farmer boy for six or seven years. They are fine; try one." He has learned something about the different trees throughout that section, and about some nuts that are being shipped in, and he can tell the varieties. He has customers that do come back after the second package of nuts. He is trying to keep those customers one year after another. He is creating the demand. When I was a youngster, if I could have received the prices for black walnuts and butternuts that youngsters get now, I would have thought I was a capitalist. Butternuts are retailing at two dollars and two dollars and a half, and black walnuts the same.

President Morris: We have got to get away from the idea that we are going to find the best hickory nut or the best walnut or the best nut of any kind in the largest nut. Nature spreads out just so much material in the way of flavor and good quality of a nut, and if it is in a large nut, those good qualities are spread out thin; if it is in a small nut, they are concentrated.

Professor Lake: I wish I were as optimistic as Mr. Littlepage in this matter. That is because he has been studying all nuts for twenty-five or thirty years, and I have only been dabbling around in Persian walnuts for about twenty years. I have been dabbling with apples twenty-five or more years, and the real connoisseurs of the apple have been telling us during that time that the Ben Davis would be wiped out inside of ten years. I heard that twenty years ago. I believe that there are more Ben Davis apples being consumed by the public today than any other one apple. Notwithstanding that, every man who knows good apples goes out and decries it. It is because that apple can be grown anywhere by anybody at any time, and will be eaten by the people. The kind of nut that is going to make the money the next twenty-five or thirty years is the nut that is prolific, of fair quality, that can be grown by any man, and that has a fairly good appearance. I believe that the process of educating the public on the matter of quality is going to be tremendously slow. It is not always the case, however, that the smaller the size, the better the quality. A medium size would be better. The Yellow Newtown is quite a large apple, and it is superior in quality to the Winesap.

President Morris: I was stating a general rule.

Professor Lake: I fear we aren't going to be able to educate the people. How many people who eat nuts know anything about their quality? Dr. Morris has got the ideal of the best nut in walnuts, for instance, the French Mayette. That is the connoisseur's choice. I know of many people who will tell you very frankly they prefer the American grown Franquette, which is much more starchy in make-up and much less nutty.

Mr. Littlepage: I think there is a great deal in what Professor Lake says. I am not sure he has got the cause of the facts he states. One reason why the Ben Davis is being planted is, as he stated, that it will grow almost anywhere; but the reason the public accept the Ben Davis is because they can't get enough of another at a reasonable price. There isn't any doubt that if there were plenty others at a reasonable price the Ben Davis wouldn't be used at all. We hear so much today about this high cost of living. Of course, there are artificial conditions that have contributed to this to a greater or less extent; but the principal element is that we have come up against the problem of feeding the great American public, that has grown faster than the facilities have grown. The time for low priced food products is gone forever. Yet there is a good deal in this commercial phase of it.

President Morris: The Hales hickory is going to be like the Ben Davis apple, one of the very most popular in the market.

Doctor Deming: I will say regarding the retail price of nuts that in New York City shelled filberts are priced at $1.25 a pound, shelled almonds $1.00, ordinary run of hickories and chestnuts in the shells twenty cents, black walnuts in the shell twelve cents.

President Morris: Hickories will give somewhat over fifty pounds to the bushel; black walnuts about forty. If we make a rough estimate of fifty pounds to the bushel for shagbarks, and forty for Persian walnuts, we will probably have a good fair average.

NUT PROMOTIONS.

What the promoter does not say it is absolutely necessary for the safe investor to find out. Deductions from experience in general, and from knowledge of the business in particular, will help and, when these favor further investigation, there are two essentials for a wise decision. First, a study of the records of the promoters, and second, a personal examination of the property. If these can be thoroughly made, and the results are satisfactory after a suitable period of mental incubation, if the prospects will stand the candle test for fertility, you may put some money on the chance of a good hatch; remembering, too, that many a good hatch afterward comes to grief with the pip.

Some promotions are conceived in iniquity, some in drunkenness and folly and some are abortive from incapacity. Your legitimate and well-born, well-brought-up promotion, fathered by ability and mothered by honesty, it is your problem to recognize, if that is what you are looking for, and to avoid the low-born trickster or incapable. No one can tell you how to do this any more than he can tell you an easy way to graft hickories.

The northern nut grower is not yet bothered with northern nut promotions. At most he is called on to discount the statements of sellers of trees, and that a little, not too expensive, experience will teach him. The West is apparently too busy selling fruit and fruit lands to lay out nuts to trap eastern nibblers. But the allurements of pecan growing in the South are spread before us with our bread and butter and morning coffee. The orange and pomelo properties have been banished from the stage, or made to play second fiddle, and now we see in the limelight the pecan plantation, with a vista of provision for old age and insurance for our children. And there shall be no work nor care nor trouble about it at all. Only something down and about ten dollars a month for ninety-six months. And the intercropping is to more than pay for that. It is indeed an enticing presentation.

Although we have as yet no northern nut promotions we may expect the time when the sandy barrens of the shore and the boulder pastures of the rock ribbed hills will be cut up into five acre plots and promoted as the natural home of the chestnut and the hickory, holding potential fortunes for their developers. I hope it will be so for it will postulate a foundation in fact. But the chestnut blight and the unresponsiveness of the hickory to propagation as yet hold up these future camp followers of the northern nut growing pioneers. So that for the present there is only the sword of the southern pecan promoter to parry.

It would be a work of supererogation and effrontery for me to attempt to treat this subject in particular since it has been so clearly and ably done by Col. C. A. Van Duzee of St. Paul, Minn., and Viking, Fla., from the standpoint of long experience and full knowledge. His paper should be read by all interested persons. I am permitted to make the following quotations from it:

"The pecan as an orchard tree has recently been discovered and its history has not been written. The record at present is largely based on scattered individual trees growing under abnormal conditions which, as a rule, are favorable....

"Calculations and deductions based upon these results have been made which are fascinating, but they are utterly unreliable when applied to orchards of other trees in different localities growing under totally different conditions?...

"No one knows what a pecan orchard grown under such conditions is going to do."

Col. Van Duzee, however, expresses firm belief in the success of pecan growing under proper personal supervision.

It all comes down to the question, "Can you or I hire our business done for us, never go near it ourselves and expect others to make a success of it for us?"

And yet, when all is said, I confess that I have been tempted by my faith in the present and future of pecan growing in the South. I might have invested were it not for my firm belief that, in nut growing, the North is but a few years behind the South, and that I wish to devote my resources and my energies to having a hand in a development which, I share with you the belief, is to be of inestimable benefit to the human race. We can picture the day when our dooryards, our roadsides, our fields and hills shall be shaded by grand nut trees, showering sustenance and wealth on our descendants, and all people, and bearing the names of their originators; when the housewife of the future shall send her wireless call to the grocer for a kilo of Hales' Papershells, the Rush, the Jones, the Pomeroy Persian walnuts, the Black Ben Deming butternut, the Craig Corean chestnut, the Morris Hybrid hickory, the Close black-walnut or the Littlepage pecan.

President Morris: It is a very timely paper. The number of promoters we find in connection with any subject furnishes an index of the fundamental value of the original proposition. The number of dishonest people, the number of fakirs that are now promoting development schemes in connection with the pecan indicates that down at the bottom somewhere, there is a real gold mine. We will go on to Mr. Roper's paper.

SOME FACTS CONCERNING PECAN TREES FOR PLANTING
IN THE NORTH.

W. N. Roper, Petersburg, Va.

Pecan trees for successful culture in the North must be of hardy, early-maturing varieties, budded on stocks from northern pecans and grown in nursery under suitable climatic conditions. These are requisites indicated by practical, experimental work and observations extending over several years.

The successful production of large southern pecans in far northern climates can hardly be looked for except under the most favorable conditions of soil, location and season. There seems no good reason for planting southern pecans in the far North, except in an experimental way; for there are northern varieties now being propagated that are the equal of most of the standard southern sorts in quality and very little below them in size. They will prove to be as large or larger in the North than the southern varieties grown in the same locality, and much more apt to bear regularly.

The method used in propagating the hardy types is important. Budding and root-grafting each has its advocates among pecan growers in the South, and this would indicate that there is no great difference between the trees propagated by these two methods when they are planted in that section. But based on results with several hundred specimens, root-grafted pecan trees are not desirable for planting in northern climates.

During the past six years there have been grown in nursery, in the eastern part of Virginia, near Petersburg, about 2,000 root-grafted trees of eight southern varieties of pecans and one Virginia variety, including Stuart, Van Deman, Moneymaker, and Mantura. All these trees are worthless. None of them, though they have been cared for, has ever been considered by the grower fit to dig and transplant. Most of these trees suffer winter injury each year, many of them being killed back to the graft union. Those that do not die below the ground grow out the following summer, only to be killed back again the next winter or spring. Those damaged only a part of the way down the trunks, even when not badly injured, do not recover promptly. Several hundred budded trees grown during the same period in adjoining rows have been entirely free from any winter injury. The grafts and buds were inserted on stocks from northern and southern nuts.

A thousand budded and root-grafted trees received from six southern nurserymen were planted in orchards in the same locality. A very large percentage of the root-grafted trees died; only a small percentage of the budded trees died. Many of the root-grafted trees that survived are making poor growth; most of the budded trees are strong and vigorous. The only trees of the Virginia varieties ever reported winter-killed were root-grafts.

No root-grafts of the northern types on northern stocks have been made in Virginia, but root-grafts of Indiana varieties on southern stocks transplanted there winter-kill badly. Several Indiana trees root-grafted on southern stocks and in their second year's growth in the nursery winter-killed in Florida last season. Not a single budded Indiana tree in Virginia suffered any winter injury whatever, although the buds were grown on southern as well as on northern stocks. All the root-grafted Indiana trees transplanted at Petersburg during the past two years have died from winter injury.

Northern types root-grafted on northern stocks not having been tested, no definite information can be given, of course; but with all southern varieties winter-killing in the North, when root-grafted on either northern or southern stocks, and the Virginia variety winter-killing when root-grafted on southern or northern stocks, and the Indiana varieties winter-killing both in the North and in the South when root-grafted on southern stocks, it seems reasonable to presume that the northern varieties root-grafted on northern stocks will also winter-kill. The stocks of the root-grafted trees are seldom injured. They send up sprouts except in cases where the graft union is so far beneath the surface of the soil that after the grafted part is killed the stock is too deep to grow out.

Not a single tree out of a total of 40,000 seedlings in Virginia grown from northern nuts planted during a period of six years has ever been found affected by winter injury; practically all the trees out of 50,000 or more grown in the same locality from southern nuts, planted during the same years had their tops affected by winter injury the first, and most of them the second season of their growth; but no injury after the second season has been noted.

With the view of making southern varieties better adapted to planting in northern area, experiments have been made in propagating them on stocks from northern nuts. This stock has thus far proved unsatisfactory for southern varieties either budded or root grafted. The trees from northern nuts go dormant earlier in the fall and remain dormant later in the spring than trees from southern nuts. Northern trees in the nursery rows in early spring, in a perfectly dormant condition, are in striking contrast with the southern trees and their fresh, green foliage. Though the growing period in the North is nearly a fourth shorter for the northern than for the southern varieties, the native trees in the North make equal growth with the southern trees there during the same season. Northern varieties budded on northern stocks grown at Petersburg the past summer made nearly as much growth during one season as root-grafted trees of the same varieties on southern stocks grown in Florida two seasons. The trees at Petersburg were from dormant buds set the previous fall. They were just starting into growth in May when the trees in Florida had made a growth of six to twelve inches.

The northern seedlings in the North make better growth in a season than the northern seedlings in the South, as far as has been observed. When the growing period begins in the northern climate, the native trees respond at once to the quick growing season and outgrow the trees that have been accustomed to a slower growing climate. When their growing period is over, they begin promptly their preparation for the winter. The long, slow growing climate of the South does not seem to give the quick growing tree of the North an opportunity for its greatest growth at the important period. There appears to be too much difference between the growing habits of the southern and the northern pecans for either to be suitable stock upon which to grow the other.

Two choice trees of Moneymaker and one of Stuart, all well grown and giving every promise of success, were selected out of a large number of these varieties budded on northern stocks, and were transplanted in orchard two years ago for experiment. The Moneymaker trees have made little growth and the Stuart tree practically none. All have an unhealthy appearance and are left standing only for further experiments.

The section of Virginia in which these experiments have been made affords very severe climatic tests. The temperature in winter sometimes goes below zero, the temperature in spring is variable, changing suddenly from warm to freezing. Pecan trees seem able to endure almost any degree of cold when they are in a thoroughly dormant condition. The winter-killing from which they often suffer in the South, as well as in the North, is due to the effect of sudden freezing temperatures following warm periods in winter or spring.

Only well grown, vigorous pecan trees should be planted in the North. It is a waste of time and money to plant indifferent pecan trees in any locality, and especially in a locality where they have to contend with severe climatic conditions. The size of the tree is less important than its root system and vigor. The purchasers of trees grown on thin, sandy soil, with the root systems consisting almost entirely of straight tap roots, destitute of laterals, need not expect success. Most of these trees will die early, and many of those that live will linger on for several seasons without making much growth, tiring out the patience of the planter.

The work of transplanting should be very carefully done and the trees given proper care and culture.

It has been found that it costs more to grow pecan nursery trees in the North than in the South, but it is believed that planters in the North will find that these trees have a value which will far offset their additional cost.

Some of the methods of propagation and care are slightly different in the North from those that usually obtain in the South. But it is not practicable to go into the details connected with this work. The facts that have been mentioned are those that are believed to be of most importance for consideration by persons planting pecan trees in the North. Those who have gone thus far with the work upon which the conclusions are based are continuing as earnestly as they began.

The outlook for the success of the pecan industry in northern territory is exceedingly promising where hardy, early-maturing varieties are properly grown in nursery on hardy stocks under climatic conditions that will best fit them for the locality in which they are to be planted.

President Morris: We can give some time to the discussion of Mr. Roper's paper. I want to ask if some of the hardy kinds which will stand the winters well may not carry their ripening season so late that they do not properly mature! Isn't this a line of observation we have got to follow out in adapting pecans to northern fields? Who has had experience?

Mr. Littlepage: That is a very important point, and it is one of the things that everyone is going to discover who is engaged in northern pecan planting on the extreme limits within the next few years. There isn't much danger of the pecan getting frost-bitten in the spring as some imagine, because the pecan tree seems to be a pretty good weather prophet. They don't get ready, as a rule, till most of the danger is past. A great majority of the Persian walnuts and pecans don't begin to pollenate till the tenth of May, and it is very rare that a tree doesn't ripen its nuts there. But once in a while we discover a tree that sets a bountiful crop annually and never matures a nut, because it gets frost bitten. It simply doesn't have the length of growing season.

Mr. Rush: I remember a pecan tree I received, and have had growing for the last six years in Pennsylvania. It was never affected with the cold, and made luxurious growth. But I haven't been so fortunate as to get it to bear, although it throws out catkins in the spring.

President Morris: The pecan tree is known to be hardy as far north as Boston. There are quite a good many near New York City, some of them fine, trees, but not bearing much, and for the most part small nuts.

Mr. Rush: Mr. Jones of Jeanerette, Louisiana, has been at my place, and he says that the growth of the pecan is just as luxuriant there as in Louisiana.

President Morris: The point we want to bring out is this, and I think we ought to emphasize it at this meeting—that pecans suitable for northern planting must include the idea of an early ripening season, earlier than the ripening season of southern pecans.

Mr. Rush: Sometimes there is a provision in nature for that. The tree will adapt itself to the climate, and give a smaller nut.

President Morris: What has been your experience, Mr. Roper?

Mr. Roper: We have only fruited Stuart at Petersburg. All the nuts have been well filled, but much smaller than the Stuart farther south.

Mr. Pomeroy: Mr. Littlepage made the remark yesterday that nature will attend to this largely for us. He spoke of the wood beginning to ripen the middle of August. With us in Niagara County, we expect that with all trees the wood will begin ripening about the first of August, preparing for the winter. Persian walnut doesn't come into blossom till about the last of May or the first of June.

President Morris: It is not mainly a matter of ripening wood, but of ripening nuts, in pecan growing in the North. A good many nuts will remain green, even though the tree will grow well; and we must have nurserymen draw our attention to this difference, when they are sending trees out to us for northern planting. That is a thing that may not be determined right now, but nurserymen must be able to report upon comparative ripening times of various kinds of pecans to be sent north.

We will have the report of the Committee on Nominations.

[The report was accepted and the nominees elected.]

President Morris: We have with us Professor Herrick, who will present his paper on the subject of the scolytus beetle. Professor Herrick has prepared his paper at our request since we came here.

THE SCOLYTUS BEETLE.

With a residence of a little over a decade in the South, I became more or less intimately connected with a good many of the nut growers of the section, especially the pecan growers. I found them there an intelligent body of men.

The President has asked me to talk just a little on the hickory bark borer. While in Mississippi, I first came into contact with the hickory bark borer by its work on the hickories on the lawn in front of my house and on the Campus. It began killing the trees. I had ten or a dozen trees on the lawn that were from six to eight inches through, and they had made a fine growth but they began suddenly to die. First, I noticed the leaves falling in the summer time, then later in the winter the branches began to die at the top. On investigation, I found that it was this little hickory bark borer. We carried out, as a result of that investigation, a few experiments, and extended them over the Campus, following the recommendations of Doctor Hopkins of the Department of Agriculture, Washington. The results were pretty gratifying. I was able to save those trees on the lawn, and during three or four years succeeding the time we got these experiments into practice, no more had died, and they had kept on making a good growth; and I believe the ravages of the beetle had been checked.

The little beetle belongs to a family called the Scolytidae—very small beetles that burrow through the bark of trees, and between the bark and the wood, partly in the bark and partly in the wood. These beetles are interesting in their life history. The female bores through the bark, and then she builds a channel partly in the wood and partly in the bark. She goes along and digs out little niches all along, and in each one of these, deposits a tiny white egg. That soon hatches into the small grub, and the grub begins to burrow out to get his food, and you will find these little burrows running out from the main burrow of the mother beetle. When these grubs reach their growth, each one of them comes out and bores a little shot-hole-like round hole through the bark, so that a tree that is pestered with it will finally have the bark full of these little round holes. You have probably seen a similar thing in peach, plum, and cherry trees.

The hickory bark borer is found all over the eastern United States, from Canada to the Gulf, and as far west as Nebraska. It attacks hickory trees and walnut trees, and as far as I can find, the authorities say probably the pecan. I never found it on the pecan in the South. If it does ever come to attack it in any numbers, it will be a serious pest from the nut grower's point of view.

In this state, it was first noticed by its work on hickory trees in the vicinity of New York City, and it is killing a good many of them. To show its dangerousness—on the estate of Mr. Wadsworth at Geneseo in 1900 and 1901 over an area of two hundred acres, it destroyed ninety to ninety-five per cent of the hickories. It really becomes a most injurious pest. These little fellows running under the bark cut off the cambium layer and girdle it, and kill the tree as effectually as if we were to take an axe and girdle it. A few can girdle it very quickly.

An infested tree in the summer shows some characteristic effects. The leaves begin to dry and wither, and finally drop. The adult beetles, when they come out in June and July, attack the petioles, leaves, and terminal buds for food, then go down to the larger branches and trunks, and burrow to lay their eggs. The younger top branches begin to die. If you look, you will very often find a little white sawdust in cracks in the bark. That is an indication that they are present. If you take off the bark, you will find such an appearance as I have shown you. Later, you will find these holes all over, showing the work of the beetle.

I will give the life history of the insect very briefly. The insects live over the winter under the bark, as grubs, and in the spring they change to the pupa form, and come out along in June and July. Some may be as late as August. Those beetles go to the branches and leaves, and soon begin laying their eggs. There is only one brood a season, in this locality at least. In a longer season, farther south, there might be more than one, although my experience in Mississippi was that there was only one brood.

A word regarding methods of control. You can readily see that there is no way of getting at the beetle with insecticides after they have gotten under the bark. Doctor Pelt mentions the value of spraying the trees in summer to kill adults when they are feeding on the petioles and probably the terminal buds and younger twigs. It is rather doubtful whether it would pay to spray hickory trees at that time, although the expense of spraying large trees is not so great as you might think. We have had experiences here, because it fell to my lot to spray all the elm trees on the Campus last year. I kept very careful account of this. We sprayed between five and six hundred trees. About one hundred are scattered over the hillsides west of the buildings, some a mile from the water supply. We did the work for about eighty-eight cents apiece, each tree having a thorough spray. The largest trees on each side of the street we gave two sprayings for a little less than forty cents apiece.

The real method of getting at this hickory bark borer is for everybody to cooperate and cut those trees out, or at least the affected parts of the tree, before the first of May. I know of no other effective method of getting them. Cut them out and burn them. Some say, peel off the bark and destroy that; but if you do that, you have got to cut off the smallest branches and burn those, and I am afraid you would not get all of the grubs. But it is better, if you can, to actually dispose of the whole tree in some way.

There were three trees on the lawn infested and dying. I cut those out in February, and that evidently stopped the ravages of the beetle. That was carried on over the whole Campus, and it must have stopped the injuries, because during the three or four years I was there after that, we had no dead hickories from that cause.

That is evidently the only method of getting at them. It has been wondered if we might not go to the Commissioner of Agriculture, and ask him to take this matter in hand and force people to cooperate, because it has become a rather serious problem. It is evident from a perusal of the law that he has power to do that, and perhaps if this Nut Growers' Association wishes to pass resolutions to bring before Commissioner Pearson, they might induce him to take some steps to control this hickory bark borer.

President Morris: If we have evidence that the hickory bark borer can destroy ninety per cent of the hickory trees on an estate so well cared for as the Wadsworth estate, it indicates a menace to the whole hickory forests of the North. In view of this fact, in view of the possibility of ninety per cent of our hickory trees being destroyed by this beetle, it seems to me that we should ask our Commissioner of Agriculture to take charge of the matter, as he has taken charge of the chestnut bark disease, requiring the cooperation of the people in disposing of a question which is so vital among the economic problems of our state. Is there any discussion on this paper?

Doctor Deming: I would like to read an extract from a letter addressed to me by H. W. Merkel, Forester of the Bronx Zoological Park:

"Under Chapter 798 of the laws of the state of New York, passed on July 26th, 1911, the Commissioner of Agriculture is authorized and charged with preventing the spread of just such pests as the Hickory bark-borer, and if this matter be called to his attention promptly and in the right way by such responsible and interested parties as the Northern Nut Growers' Association, there is, undoubtedly, still time to check the further spread of the pest. We have from now until June (the time when a new generation of beetles will emerge) to take whatever action is necessary, and I urge upon you to persuade the Nut Growers' Association to take the necessary steps. I would be glad to have a conference with you on this matter, and will be glad to help you in any way you wish."

I would suggest the appointment of a committee to draw up a strong set of resolutions to be sent to the Commissioner of Agriculture of the State of New York and perhaps of other states, and to the Department of Agriculture. (Referred to Executive Committee for report.)

President Morris: We will have next in order the paper by Professor Lake on the Persian walnut in California.