DR. MACDANIEL: I'd like to ask a question. In F-2 hybrid walnuts do you find much segregation of those for later initiation of vegetation?
DR. MCKAY: Yes, we find in those seedlings in some cases the tendency to vegetate very early and others very late. The most striking case that I know is an F-1 hybrid which is a very, very late starter in the spring. It is perfectly dormant when the other young walnuts are in practically full leaf. We do not have any offspring from that particular one yet, but it gives us some hope that from this hybrid we may get something later.
MR. BECKER: With us I don't think this early vegetation means anything. We are in Michigan. Dark, cold weather continues until about the middle of May, when frost ends, and then all of a sudden spring breaks loose, everything comes out, and we don't have any setback, as a rule, from then on. So early vegetation matters little, means nothing, the way I feel about it.
DR. CRANE: Mr. Moderator, you ought to point out that most of the United States isn't Michigan. If we had climatic conditions that Michigan has, we wouldn't have that problem, but this problem becomes much more acute, for example, as you go south.
The north knows nothing about cold injury, absolutely nothing. If you want to see cold injury, you go south. I told Dr. George Potter that twelve years ago. He was born and raised in Wisconsin and spent 17 years in the mountains of New Hampshire. I told him he never saw any winter injury, and he said, "Why, I never heard such a wild statement in my life." Well, that was because of the fact he had never seen it. He has been in the South now for 12 years, and he says, "You made a very truthful statement." He has seen the injury.
In Oregon in 1950 or '51 we had a fall freeze. The temperature was measured by the Experiment Station in Eastern Oregon, where they are trying to grow some fruit and nut trees so they will have something else to eat besides sage brush. They had extensive plantings of walnuts, Mayette, Franquette and all of those hardy varieties, and along with them they had some Carpathians. The temperature there in the fall dropped to 36 degrees below zero, and all of their walnuts of these other strains were killed to the ground, but the Carpathian came through uninjured. In the spring of the year however it warmed up, the Carpathians leafed out and were about ready to bloom when there was a sharp freeze, and the Carpathians sure got it in the neck. So what difference does it make whether you lose the trees in the winter or you lose them in the spring? You have lost them just the same. I think we ought to hear Spencer Chase cite the history of their big collection of Carpathians in Tennessee Valley Authority. I understand from him that they have never fruited any Carpathians down there at all. It's not winter hardiness, it's this early foliation. So we have got a lot of areas that are vastly different from that peninsula in Michigan which the Good Lord designed to make a favored country in a lot of respects.
DR. MCKAY: I recognize Mr. Devitt, who is here from Canada and is well qualified to discuss Reverend Crath's work there.
MR. DEVITT: It is interesting to me to hear of this early budding and late fruiting. Along the north shore of Lake Ontario and down through the Niagara Peninsula our climate is quite consistent. There was only one year when we had a late frost—it was on May 19th. That was in the year 1936. Every other year since they have bloomed every year.
MR. STOKE: I'd like to speak of a tree Mr. Crath sent me. The tree was bearing in Toronto 20 years ago. With me it winter kills sometime in the winter each year, I don't know when. In some years it has been killed back to 5-year-old wood, and this spring I found it was all dead. This tree comes out of dormancy as soon as the sun gets warm. It's hardy in Toronto but not hardy in Virginia.
DR. MCKAY: I think you can all see why this problem is one of the most acute ones we have to deal with today. This variation over the country in the behavior of this so-called hardy strain of walnut is of great interest now to people everywhere. People are believing that it can be grown, and there are still problems we have not solved. I would like to have just a brief statement from Spencer Chase on the performance of Carpathian varieties at Norris, Tennessee.
MR. CHASE: We reported this, I think, at our Beltsville meeting several years ago. Trees we had at Norris are Carpathian types secured from the Wisconsin Horticultural Society about 1940. After two years in the nursery they were planted, and last year, 1952, was the first year that they bore any nuts. But that was simply because we did not have a late frost last year. This year, they were all frosted again. So we have, in the South, from Virginia and Tennessee to a little farther southward, a problem of early vegetation of English walnuts. We should encourage everyone to watch for any late vegetating kinds for trial in the South.
MR. STOKE: Dr. Dunstan reported two walnut trees in North Carolina, where the season is about ten days earlier than at my place in Virginia that blossomed after the first of May. I am going to investigate these trees further.
DR. MCKAY: We have about five minutes that we might devote to some other problem. Nearly all of us do grafting work of one sort or another. Do I have a question from the floor on grafting?
MR. MACHOVINA: With cleft grafts or splice grafts held with grafting rubbers, do you have to cut the rubbers?
DR. MACDANIEL: If it's a chestnut and you have it waxed, I think the answer is yes.
MR. MACHOVINA: The wax is a hot wax and the rubber does not disintegrate very quickly.
DR. MACDANIEL: Probably you will have to cut it on species in which the growth bulges up between the turns of the rubber. This is true of chestnuts in particular, possibly persimmons, walnuts probably not quite so much trouble. Let's hear from one of the nurserymen.
MR. BERNATH: I think the best way is after the union is firm enough, to cut the rubber with a sharp knife.
MR. STOKE: I'd make one qualification. I said I didn't think you had to cut rubber. I think that's true with grafting above ground. Underneath ground, with moisture around it, it should be cut.
MR. BERNATH: If you leave the rubber on and bury it, that lasts for years. Even above ground you find it sometimes.
MR. PATAKY: If you get a fast-growing callus, you have to cut the rubber band, but if it is rather slow you don't. I do a lot of budding with roses. I don't cut the rubber bands off, because they will eventually drop off. If you graft a black walnut or Persian, you will have to cut it or it will girdle the graft.
MR. STOKE: It doesn't do it for me.
A MEMBER: Has anybody done work with polyethylene film in grafting?
MR. BECKER: I hesitate to tell you my experiment. I don't think much of it. I used polyethylene bags on chestnuts early in the season, and practically every one grew, but everything else that was out in the hot sun boiled. In the hot weather of June the grafts actually cook in the bags.
MR. MACHOVINA: Did you use a bag over the whole graft, or just a tube around it?
MR. BECKER: A bag over the whole thing. I have a few Carpathian grafts that grew well. I think I have better luck with hot wax than anything else.
DR. McKAY: Our time is up. I want to thank the panel, although we didn't work you too hard. The panel is adjourned.
PRESIDENT BEST: Dr. Gravatt will show a film entitled: "It Bringeth
Forth Much Fruit."
* * * * *
DR. GRAVATT: Mr. President, ladies and gentlemen, you all are familiar with the fact that the chestnut blight is loose in Europe. It was reported in Italy in 1938, and it spread rather rapidly in Italy. It had been there many years before they found it. In spite of our numerous warnings to get them to watch for it, they let it get away. It has spread into Switzerland, caused a great deal of damage there with no hope of saving the larger chestnuts there or in Italy. It's spreading into Yugoslavia. They are making very energetic efforts to control the disease in Yugoslavia, trying to delay it as much as possible. It happens the forest pathologist who handles this work is a young lady, and she has got the forester and other people interested to try to hold it back as long as possible.
The threat of the chestnut blight to the entire chestnut growth in all of Southern Europe helped to bring about the organization of an International Chestnut Council and Congress. This is made-up of delegates from a number of the European countries, Spain, Portugal, France, Switzerland, Yugoslavia, Greece, Turkey, Japan and the United States. They have been meeting every other year, first for two years in succession, but the plan now is to meet every other year. They had a meeting in Spain and Portugal this past June, and the State Department paid my expenses over, and so forth, to attend as a delegate from the United States at this international meeting.
The meeting was very enjoyable. They have a very fine system there. They hire big buses to take you around over the country. Your hotel is all arranged for in advance, and you go sightseeing to the orchards and utilization plants. We have meetings just here and there along the way where we stop a half day or a day.
The next meeting will probably be held in about two years. They have decided now that the meetings will be more in the way of conferences, because the last three meetings have been partly sightseeing to observe chestnut orchards and laboratories.
The possibility of holding the meeting in the United States has been discussed by the delegates there. But it involves a lot of expense and the delegates were of the opinion that there would be a very small meeting in the United States, because the countries over there simply couldn't afford the expense of sending them over here.
The problem in Italy is very serious, because they have something over a million acres of grafted chestnut orchards, all of which they are probably going to lose, and something like a million acres of coppice growth that is going to be damaged but not such a severe loss. In connection with the work in Italy I suggested the production of a movie film that could be shown to the Italian people showing the chestnut industry and also the chestnut blight. This was to be shown in different parts of Italy to arouse more interest in watching out for the disease. They have more opportunity there of slowing up the disease if they will work hard at it, but they are not doing too much.
As some of you know when a lot of different people and agencies work on a movie film there must be all sorts of compromises. This was done by a temperamental Italian director, and other people had parts in it, so what you see is a compromise. They made 30 copies in Italian. H has been shown in many moving picture houses, and it is also on the loan basis to the United States. There are extensive film loan libraries, located in different parts of Italy, so any high school, college forestry group can borrow films showing different operations, many of them prepared in the United States and part of them in Italy.
DR. MACDANIEL: What about this so-called Korean chestnut? Is it actually a third species?
DR. GRAVATT: I don't think so, We had quite a bit of argument on this question, because in Spain where I found chestnut blight on chestnuts brought from Japan, we found the name Korean chestnut. Sometimes the Korean chestnut looks more like a Jap, sometimes it looks more like a Chinese, and usually it's sort of a blend between the two. We prefer to recognize these two species and call the Korean a natural hybrid. Both species are grown in pure form in Korea, and they intercross readily, and we do not regard it as a new species.
MR. WILSON: Are the Italian enough aware of their problem so that they will have developed an Asiatic chestnut in time to replace their present orchards, so that there will not be an interim?
DR. GRAVATT: There will be a big interim. That's an opportunity in this country to get the market before the Italians ever come back, I think.
(The film, "It Bringeth Forth Much Fruit" was shown.)
The International Chestnut Commission and the Chestnut Blight Problem in
Europe, 1953
G. FLIPPO GRAVATT, Senior Pathologist, U. S. Plant Industry Station,
Beltsville, Maryland
The International Chestnut Commission was organized under the auspices of the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations. The aim of the Commission is to promote international cooperation in the study of all scientific, technical, and economic questions relating to chestnut growing. The main problem facing all chestnut culture in Europe is the rapid spread of the chestnut blight. France, Italy, Japan, Portugal, Spain, Switzerland, Turkey, United States and Yugoslavia are members of the organization. A representative from the F.A.O. in Rome serves as Secretary of the Commission. An international conference on chestnut problems was held in France in 1950, the first meeting of the Commission was held in Italy and Switzerland in 1951 and the second in Spain and Portugal, June 18-30, 1953. The average attendance at the meetings was 50 to 60 persons. I have attended all three conferences as the representative from the U.S. Departments of State and Agriculture.
The International Chestnut Commission meetings differ from the meetings of the Northern Nut Growers Association in many ways. Our Northern Nut Growers Association meets annually for 2-1/2 days while the meetings of the International Chestnut Commission last from 10 to 12 days but not every year. In Europe the members travel mostly in a large tourist bus, which carries the party for hundreds of miles, visiting nurseries, orchards, chestnut utilization plants and not neglecting the scenic parts of the route. All lodging and meals are carefully arranged for in advance. The group in Europe is made up quite largely of Federal and State professional workers, University professors, and representatives from the chestnut utilization industries.
Among the places which the delegates visited in Spain in 1953 was the Agricultural Experiment Station at La Coruna, where the Phytophthora ink disease of the chestnut has been studied extensively. They also visited the Experiment Station at Pontevedra, where new methods of propagating chestnuts are being studied. At Bilboa and at Villa Presente Nursery, Santander, we inspected plantings of Asiatic chestnuts; I found chestnut blight present on several trees at both locations and recommended immediate removal of the diseased trees. Fortunately, the Asiatic chestnuts are some distance from any native European chestnuts at each place and, according to the local foresters, the blight has not spread to the distant stands of native chestnut. Some years ago the Spanish authorities imported seed from Asia; chestnut blight probably was brought in on these nuts. All infected trees that are found are being destroyed, but a thorough inspection and eradication program is needed to control the disease before it spreads into the native European chestnut stands, from which the disease probably would spread into Portugal and southwestern France.
In Portugal we inspected many very fine chestnut orchards. These orchards are composed of grafted varieties, with only 3 or 4 varieties in each locality or region. Because of this there is a more standard nut product in most of Portugal than in the other European countries where mixtures of local varieties are frequently grown. A very large portion of the European chestnut orchards in Portugal are made up of seedling trees, topworked with local selections. In Portugal most of the orchards are located on the lower slopes and various crops are grown among the trees. In most other European countries the orchards are on rougher mountain land which is grazed.
In Portugal the State Road Department has established a number of roadside plantings of chestnut. These plantings are very productive. The State Road Department sells the nut crop to the highest bidder and uses the funds for additional roadside tree plantings.
In northern Portugal authorities have conducted a large-scale program to control the Phytophthora ink disease of chestnut by the following treatment: The soil is removed from the base of the tree and larger roots. The base and roots are sprayed with a sticker compound and then dusted with copper oxide and copper sulfate before the soil is replaced. Treatment is repeated every 5 to 7 years. Government officials secured the cooperation of owners of chestnut stands in treating practically all trees over large areas. Although this treatment for the Phytophthora ink disease was originally worked out by the Spanish pathologists at La Coruna, it has not been used extensively in Spain. The Phytophthora root disease is damaging chestnut orchards throughout southern Europe. In 1950 I noted that this disease was causing severe damage even in Asia Minor. In the southern part of the United States this same disease (here called Phytophthora root rot) caused heavy losses at lower elevations.
The 1953 Chestnut Commission meeting terminated on June 30 at the famous Palace Hotel at Bussaco, Portugal, where the Under Secretary of Agriculture gave the delegates an official farewell dinner. No definite plans were made for the next meeting of the Commission. It was the general opinion that a meeting in the United States would be poorly attended because of the expense of sending the delegates from Europe.
After the conclusion of the meeting, the U. S. Foreign Agriculture Services sponsored my trip to France, Italy, Switzerland, and Yugoslavia, to consult with Federal and local authorities on their chestnut blight problems. This disease was found in Genoa, Italy, in 1938; later it was determined that the disease was present at that time in other localities in Italy. The blight is spreading rapidly and is almost completely destroying the orchard and larger forest trees of European chestnut in Italy in localities where the disease has been present for some time. The blight occurs in many areas in northern Italy and as far south as Naples. The young chestnut coppice is not so seriously affected, but the losses caused by the blight will make growing coppice on a 10- to 20-year rotation basis less profitable than formerly.
The chestnut blight is abundantly present on the east slopes of the mountains along the French-Italian border; although it has not yet been found in France, its distribution in adjoining Italy makes it highly probable that advance spot infections are already present in France. The blight has spread into Tessin Province in southeastern Switzerland where it is destroying many of the orchards and forest trees. A large chestnut extract plant in this Province uses wood in making tannin for leather manufacturers. However, this plant, as well as some of the extract plants in northern Italy, is unable to utilize the chestnut wood as fast as the blight is killing chestnut trees.
In Yugoslavia, chestnut blight is spreading rapidly in the orchards and native growth along the Italian border. Authorities are actively cutting out all advance spot infections, to delay or possibly stop its spread across their country. In Yugoslavia, chestnut stands frequently are widely separated, a natural advantage in delaying the spread of the blight.
Chestnut blight has been controlled in western North America, where chestnut orchards and plantings are not numerous. Scattered infections have been found during the last 30 years in California, Oregon, Washington, and British Columbia; infected trees have been removed. Strict State Quarantine regulations have been enforced, to prevent chestnut blight from spreading to the West Coast.
The chestnut blight fungus is attacking three of the important oaks of Europe. The typical fanlike mycelial growth can be observed in the bark of infected oaks. In 1953 in Yugoslavia I observed vigorous young durmast oak (Quercus petraea) being killed by the blight. In Italy I found the disease killing pubescent oaks (Q. pubescens) and causing minor injury to the holly oak (Q. ilex). Before we can estimate the probable damage to these European oaks, we need more information on the effects of this disease on oaks of various ages and under various environmental conditions. In the United States the post oak (Quercus stellata) is the only oak species that has been seriously damaged by the blight.
Thus, the blight is threatening not only the native chestnut forest growth and orchards of Europe, but also the oaks. A steady extension of the blight throughout Italy can be expected. Advance infections in Yugoslavia are being cut out but how long the disease can be held back depends on future efforts along this line. Delay work in Yugoslavia also delays the time of loss of the chestnut and damage to the oak growth of Greece and Turkey. The inspection and eradication work being carried out in Spain may result in the elimination of this threat to the chestnuts and oaks in Spain, Portugal and southwest France. However, there is the possibility of the blight occurring anywhere in Europe. People working with chestnut should be on the alert to find and eradicate the first infections.
The film entitled "It Bringeth Forth Much Fruit", shown here today, was prepared at my suggestion by the U. S. Foreign Agricultural Services at Rome. It is being used to aid local authorities in Italy in attempts to delay the spread of the chestnut blight.
The Italian authorities, with assistance from the United States Foreign Agricultural Service, have purchased blight-resistant chestnuts in this country for planting in Italy. These resistant chestnuts are doing very well in Italy so far. However, the development of a new orchard industry with the Chinese chestnut and its hybrids in Italy will be a slow process. It is expected that shipments of chestnuts from Italy to this country, which is now going on at a rate of 15 to 18 million pounds per year, will gradually decrease.
DR. GRAVATT: I will talk on while they are fixing this next film.
Much of the trouble in Italy is that so many of the chestnut orchards are overgrazed, sadly overgrazed, and as these chestnut orchards are killed by the blight, the land is going back into this overgrazed condition, which leads to serious erosions. Italy needs all the water that can be saved. The mountains are eroded down to the rock in many areas and when you get to the rock, you can never bring the soil back. It's a serious problem to meet because of the tremendous over-population. Every little twig of wood is used. As these chestnut orchards are killed it's going to be a very difficult problem to plant them again because the land is overgrazed. Protecting the plantings against sheep and the goats is quite a problem.
(The film, "The Filbert Valleys," was shown.)
MR. STOKE: I noticed them grafting chestnut trees several feet from the ground. Why are they doing that?
DR. GRAVATT: They are doing it in order to develop a quick supply of scion wood. But the procedure is bad. It is much better to graft close to the ground, and mound it up with dirt. The blight gets in below the graft if the graft is high on the trunk. They have had success grafting below the ground level and find they may get a shoot six feet high the first year.
DR. MACDANIEL: How about the incompatibility in the graft? Does that show up much?
DR. GRAVATT: We don't know yet, because they always get a certain number of failures. I looked over quite a lot of grafting of Chinese chestnuts on Japanese-European hybrids, and they are thriving. After four years they are already regular trees with big crops on them.
PRESIDENT BEST: Our first paper is "Rooting Chestnuts from Softwood
Cuttings" by Roger W. Pease.
Rooting Chestnuts from Softwood Cuttings
ROGER W. PEASE, West Virginia Agricultural Experiment Station,
Morgantown, W. Va.
Some 15 or 20 years ago the West Virginia Agricultural Experiment Station undertook to develop, if possible, blight resistant chestnuts from American chestnut stock. With the passage of time the approach to the problem has changed. During the early days little thought was given to procedures for propagation, but recently the emphasis has shifted toward methods for propagation when and if there are found hardy, timber-type, blight-immune chestnuts of any species.
The practicability of budding or grafting chestnuts is debatable. We are leaving budding and grafting to experienced workers throughout the country and are endeavoring to develop a method for rooting chestnuts from softwood cuttings. Results so far are encouraging, but the work is still in the experimental stage. We do not advise anyone to start rooting chestnuts on a commercial basis, but we hope that further experimental work will be done by interested agencies.
To give complete details of several years' work would take more time than is feasible here. Circular 87, Growing American Holly from Cuttings—Cold Frame Method, obtainable from the Mailing Room, West Virginia Agricultural Experiment Station, Morgantown, West Virginia, gives construction details of a suitable bottom-heated cold frame. However, with chestnuts, natural shade was not used and half of the sunlight was excluded. An article in the October issue of The National Horticultural Magazine—"Rooting Chestnuts from Cuttings"—outlines procedure and results through 1952.
In this paper I will present a resume of our experiences and observations. Our facilities were limited so that the number of cuttings set in each case was very small. Percentages of failure or success should be taken as indicative only.
In the propagation experiments, preliminary observations were made by placing softwood cuttings in a bottom-heated cold frame at intervals during the growing season. The soil medium was two thirds washed sand and one third peat moss. Daily watering was by a hand hose. The root-inducing substance was indole-butyric acid crystals in a talc based mixture, one to one hundred. The results were completely negative.
The next season a small cold room was constructed in which conditions thought to be desirable could be maintained. Air temperature was kept at approximately 65 deg. F., fog nozzles were operated continuously except for an occasional airing of the cold room, and about 200 foot candles of white fluorescent light were delivered upon the rooting surface. The rooting medium was white, washed, building sand placed over one half inch of sphagnum moss. The moss, in turn, had been laid in a rooting bench with a hardware cloth bottom exposed to the air. The interior air circulation was maintained by an electric fan operating day and night. The soil temperature was held at 70 deg. F.
Cuttings were taken at intervals throughout the season and their basal sections soaked in a water-based solution of indole-butyric acid crystals at concentrations varying around 60 parts per million. During a 70-day period roots were formed on cuttings taken in June, July, and August. Among the successful cases the poorest result was 66-2/3%, and the best was 100%.
The young plants were fed nutrient solution and later transplanted to a light, sandy soil within a bottom-heated cold frame. Some roots were dead at the time of transplanting, burned, perhaps, by the nutrient solution. The soil temperature within the cold frame was maintained at 70 deg. F. until late in the fall, and then the plants were hardened by reducing the water content of the soil medium and lowering the temperature. All of the plants were dead when they were inspected in March.
The next year a bottom-heated cold frame was equipped with fog nozzles. The soil medium was white, washed, building sand. Softwood cuttings, treated the same as the previous year, were inserted on August 20. Cuttings from juvenile American chestnut seedling trees, juvenile Chinese trees, and mature Chinese trees were used. Within a 70 day period heavy root systems were formed on 54-6/11% of the cuttings from the juvenile Chinese trees, 50% from mature Chinese trees, and 20% from juvenile American trees. No nutrient solution was applied, the young plants were transplanted to a sandy soil in another cold frame, were hardened as during the previous year, but the soil medium was not allowed to freeze during the winter. In April the plants showed well-formed terminal buds starting to swell and turn green. Some were transplanted into pots and placed in the greenhouse; others were transplanted into a light soil in a lath house. All died subsequent to transplanting. Inspection of the roots showed severe breakage. It was concluded that repeated transplanting had been fatal, and that in the future cuttings would be rooted in plant bands or pots and transplanted only once.
It is too early in the current season for accurate results to be recorded. However, modifications have been tried and observations made. These are presented here in outline.
Type of cutting:
a. Cuttings with soft, growing tips will apparently root more quickly than hardened shoots, but the leaves tend to turn brown and the plant dies. Conversely, cuttings from short, lateral growth, well-hardened, will retain their leaves better and eventually show a higher percentage of success.
b. Cuttings made from the basal and intermediary sections of long shoots show a greater death incidence than do well-hardened, terminal sections. Both types root satisfactorily.
c. Apparently sucker shoots and water sprouts are useless.
Time of taking cuttings:
a. Cuttings taken in late May, with soft growing tips, rooted quickly—some within two weeks. On the other hand, their foliage darkened quickly, and death followed. Short, lateral shoots, well-hardened, were not available in May.
b. As the season progressed, the percentage of rooted cuttings with healthy foliage apparently rose, at least through July, but roots were formed more slowly by the late season cuttings.
Condition of parent tree:
Apparently tree vigor as indicated by healthy, dark green foliage, is more important than vigor as indicated by the length of current season's growth. In Morgantown this has been one of the driest seasons on record. Cuttings from trees with pale or brown foliage, or with foliage tending to be brittle from lack of water soon lost their leaves. Whether this was caused by the condition of the parent tree or of the individual cutting is not apparent. It is too early to determine whether or not the drought will cause a general lowering of rooting percentages this year.
Root formation:
Cuttings may or may not callus. Roots seldom if ever spring from the extreme base of a cutting. Well above the base the stem enlarges, turns white, cracks, and sends out roots. Often the bottom inch of the cutting is black and dead, with a healthy and vigorous root system above the blackened portion.
Plant bands and pots:
Plant bands are apparently preferable to small pots. The slope of the pots tends to pack the soil medium and interfere with aeration. Bands or pots less than three inches in diameter tends to cramp the rapidly growing roots.
Cold room vs. cold frame:
Last year higher percentages of success were obtained in the cold room than in the bottom-heated cold frame. This year the cold frame was definitely superior. Because construction and operation of a suitable cold room is expensive, we do not plan to continue its use in chestnut work.
Fog nozzles:
In the cold frame, fog nozzles operating during eight hours each day are apparently more effective than nozzles operating continuously.
Auxin:
No success has been attained with indole-butyric acid crystals in a talc-based powder or with untreated cuttings.
Formula for preparing auxin:
The auxin solution is prepared as recommended by G. H. Poesch in the Ohio Agricultural Experiment Station Bimonthly Bulletin, 191, April, 1938. One gram of indole-butyric acid crystals is dissolved in 125 cc. of 95% alcohol. Then 125 cc. of distilled water is added. This makes a stock solution of four thousand parts to a million in strength. The stock may be cut to the desired strength with distilled water. For late August cuttings, well-hardened, 80 parts per million is not too strong. For early June cuttings, forty parts per million appears to be adequate. The softer the cuttings, the weaker should be the solution.
Algae:
In both the cold frame and the cold room the growth of algae is a problem. The sand medium becomes crusted, with subsequent interference with aeration. The algae sometimes creeps up the stems of cuttings, coats the leaves, and covers terminal buds. Starting each season with completely clean sand and equipment will not prevent the appearance of algae over a long season of continuous operation. On August 20 of this year the interior of the cold frame, including all of the plants, was well dusted with tri-basic copper sulphate, according to manufacturer's directions. To date no effect is noticeable either on the algae or on the plants.
The various observations reported here should be verified by further tests. They are offered merely as aids to anyone planning to experiment with rooting chestnuts. When sufficient data and experience have been gained, a complete Station circular will be published.
PRESIDENT BEST: If you have any questions, please save them until later. It's been suggested that we hear from Dr. Jesse D. Diller next, and that will give our good work horse, Dr. Crane, a chance to build up again for us, because we are going to work him mighty hard.
DR. DILLER: I'd like to have the title of my paper changed to,
"Evaluating Chestnuts Grown Under Forest Conditions."
Evaluating Chestnuts Grown under Forest Conditions
JESSE D. DILLER, Pathologist, Division of Forest Pathology, Bureau of
Plant Industry, Soils, and Agricultural Engineering, U. S. Department of
Agriculture, Beltsville, Maryland
During the 49-year period since chestnut blight was first reported from New York City, the U. S. Department of Agriculture has made more than 500 importations of chestnut seeds and scions, including nearly every species of chestnut in the world, as well as some closely related chinkapins and Castanopsis species. As early as 1909 the Department initiated chestnut breeding work. It was known that few, if any, of the chestnut, or related species, possess the timber-type characteristics of our American chestnut. It was also known that, in general, the Asiatic species show great natural resistance to the blight. But little, or nothing, was known about their site requirements.
In 1927 the U. S. Division of Forest Pathology began breeding chestnuts to produce timber-type trees. The chestnut breeding work was expanded and has been carried on actively to date. From 1927 to 1930, the Division conducted an extensive exploration in search of orchard and timber-type chestnut in China, Korea, and Japan, and imported over 250 bushels of chestnut seed, representing four species.
During the early 1930's the Division of Forest Pathology distributed thousands of chestnut seedlings, grown from the imported chestnut seed. The planting stock was made available to interested Federal and State agencies, as well as to owners of farm woodlands, located in 32 Eastern States. The cooperators were asked to establish small experimental forest plantings with the trees furnished them. It was believed that such wide distribution of the many kinds would readily demonstrate which ones possess the desired timber-tree form, or possessed the ability to bear large crops of nuts suitable to wildlife; and would furnish valuable information on their site requirements.
As we now know, most of these early cooperative experimental forest plantings were doomed to failure because often the chestnut trees were planted on dry, grassy areas having infertile, shallow soil. Another serious contributing factor in poor establishment was the severe general droughts that occurred over most of the eastern half of the United States in the early thirties. But despite these heavy losses, a few plantations succeeded, in part, and from these limited areas, and from a few earlier plantations that succeeded, valuable information on their general site requirements was obtained; however, we still lacked information on specific differences in behavior between the progeny, as fast-growing forest trees or nut producers in the forest.
From these early plantings we learned that (1) Asiatic chestnuts and hybrids are more likely to develop into forest trees when planted on cool, moist, fertile situations; (2) in their silvicultural characteristics they are more nearly like our native yellow-poplar, northern red oak, and white ash, than like our American chestnut and native chinkapins; (3) with respect to tolerance of shade, they are much like our northern red oak; and (4) neither the Chinese nor the Japanese chestnut has quite the same forest-type growth as that of our native American chestnut.
With this background of experience, the U. S. Division of Forest Pathology from 1936 to 1939 established a series of 21 climatic test plots on above-average sites on Federal- and State-owned forest land in eight Eastern States. Fortunately, we still had available suitable planting stock of the many kinds of chestnut, chinkapins, and hybrids for conducting such an extensive test. At this point we should also mention that from 1947 to date, the Division of Forest Pathology, in cooperation with the Connecticut Agricultural Experiment Station, also established 11 hybrid test plots in Arkansas, Connecticut, Illinois, Michigan, Ohio, Pennsylvania, South Carolina, Tennessee, and West Virginia. In 1930 the Brooklyn Botanic Garden also began breeding blight-resistant chestnuts of timber type, and in 1947 transferred this project to the Connecticut Agricultural Experiment Station.
The 21 climatic test plots ranged from one to two acres each, and were planted with more than 20 progenies represented, as well as forest-tree chinkapin and some hybrids. Nearly all of the 21 climatic test plots were fenced against deer and domestic livestock. The 11 hybrid test plots, approximately 1/4 acre each, were planted with 100 hybrids (50 furnished by each of the two agencies), and 50 Chinese chestnuts—P.I. 58602, the most outstanding Chinese chestnut from the forestry standpoint, thus far discovered. The climatic test plots were established on freshly cleared forest sites, with trees randomized, and planted 8 feet apart. In the hybrid test plots, the seedlings were planted under forest growth and the overstory trees were girdled; the seedlings were randomized in these plots, with spacing of 10 by 10 feet.
The 1- to 6-year period of testing for the hybrid chestnut, and the 14- to 17-year period of testing of the chestnuts planted in the climatic test plots are too short for final judgment of performance; however, certain characteristics are appearing with reference to blight resistance, winter hardiness, timber-tree form, early fruiting, and rate of growth. The present paper does not attempt to summarize all of the data obtained from all these climatic plots but rather to point out some striking results obtained from several widely separated climatic plots. Results from the hybrid test plots are not included in this discussion.
Discussion
A performance rating of 28 chestnuts, chestnut hybrids, and forest-tree chinkapins, tested in forest plantings for 12 to 13 years in Indiana, Iowa, North Carolina, and Pennsylvania showed that certain kinds always produce better trees than others. P.I. 58602 is the best Chinese chestnut tested thus far, as determined by performance in the above-mentioned test plots and in several plantations established in 1926. In the Middle Western States, all Japanese chestnuts, Henry (forest-tree) chinkapins, and the "ever-blooming" Sequin chestnuts have shown poor growth or have died. They do not appear to be winter hardy.
On the basis of these findings, the Division of Forest Pathology since 1946, has made available to Federal and State agencies only one introduction of Chinese chestnut—P.I. 58602—for planting as forest trees. They were distributed in lots of 50 trees, and used to establish 1/4-acre demonstration forest plots. All are located on public-owned land on favorable forest sites where Asiatic chestnuts would be expected to do well. The underplanting-and-girdling method was recommended in the establishment of all the plots.
Chinese chestnut P.I. 58602, because of its superiority in performance as a forest tree, is now also being used extensively at Beltsville, Maryland, in hybridizing work. Nearly all of the Japanese chestnut, Henry chinkapin, and Sequin chestnuts, as well as inferior hybrids in the climatic test plots during the past several years have died a natural death or have been destroyed. They have been replaced with Chinese chestnut (P.I. 58602) replants—thus gradually converting the climatic test plots into future Chinese chestnut "seed" plots of the very best Chinese chestnuts.
During the spring of 1953 several nurserymen members of the Northern Nut Growers' Association furnished the Division of Forest Pathology a total of 2,600 Chinese chestnut seedlings for tests to determine their suitability for forest planting. These and 600 seedlings of Chinese chestnut P.I. 58602 are now being tested for performance, in randomized plots, on favorable forest sites in North Carolina, Ohio, and Illinois.
Conclusions
Of 28 Asiatic chestnuts, forest-tree chinkapins, and hybrids grown in 21 climatic test plots in the eastern United States under forest conditions, only certain Chinese and hybrid chestnuts show promise of becoming satisfactory timber-type trees. The best Chinese chestnut discovered thus far is P.I. 58602—a seed importation made by the U. S. Department of Agriculture in 1924, from Nanking, China. Foresters, as well as farm woodland owners, interested in growing Asiatic chestnuts as timber trees, should accept only planting stock that, through performance under forest conditions, is known to develop into straight, single-stemmed trees.
PRESIDENT BEST: I think that Dr. Crane has his panel ready.
DR. CRANE: Mr. President, before I start, I have a few slides here to illustrate a couple of points before we call the panel to the rostrum. (Several slides were shown illustrating sunscald injury to the Southwest side of high headed Chinese chestnut tree trunks.)
DR. CRANE: On this panel, I want to get representatives from the various states. Mr. Wilson, from Georgia. Mr. Stoke from Virginia. Mr. Silvis from Ohio. Mr. Allaman from Pennsylvania. There is another good man down there who grows a lot of chestnuts, by the name of Gibbs.
Now, there seems to be a lot of disagreement in regard to the Chinese chestnut in two or three respects. One is the problem of named varieties versus seedlings. Another big problem is hardiness, how hardy they are, these Chinese chestnuts. Where can we grow them and where are they going to fail? A third question is the ability of the Chinese chestnut to compete with other vegetation as Dr. Diller has discussed. I think we ought to settle some of these questions for once and maybe for all, or at least for this meeting, through a discussion. Nurserymen and others have emphasized that chestnuts, to be successful in the United States and hardy, should come from North China, at the Great Wall or beyond. Others don't agree, claiming that chestnuts in China are grown from the extreme south to the extreme north and that we ought to do the same in this country also.
MR. STOKE: I haven't enough knowledge on it to express an opinion. I planted a good many seeds I got from the Yokahama Nursery Company, and the nuts were rather inferior as to size. They were healthy and hardy, but I don't know where they came from. I presume they came from Korea, but I am not sure. The size and productivity wasn't too high of that seedling stock I secured there.
DR. CRANE: What do you folks think? Anyone in the audience that has an idea?
MR. PATAKY: At our fall meeting in the Ohio group we had two bushels of chestnuts from Sterling Smith. As far as I know the seed is Korean chestnut, which is obviously a Chinese variety. He had three bushels last fall and they looked identically like the American chestnut. Mr. Stoke said the quality wasn't so good in what he had. That might be true, but I tested a lot of these chestnuts from Sterling Smith, and compared them with American chestnuts. They were just as good or better than the American.
MR. CALDWELL: I spent about a year in China travelling pretty well throughout the country. I believe you will find the better seed sources in the southern part. China is like Southern Florida or warmer for part of the year and yet in the other six months it would be colder than it is right here in Rochester.
They have timber trees, some as big as 50 or 60 feet high and two or three feet in diameter. In the warmer area you find better seed by far. What Dr. Diller describes as No. 58602 is not just one tree, but a whole collection of trees from a certain area where the trees have proven their resistance not only to cold but to frost injury in the spring or in the fall, which is even more important than the straight cold hardiness. Some people have mistaken ideas about the value of seed from trees in the northern part of China above the Great Wall. This area may have intense cold in the wintertime, but not in the spring or fall.
DR. GRAVES: Dr. Caldwell is right about No. 58602 being a mixture. Dr. Gravatt could tell you about that. It is a strain coming from several trees. It's evidently a very fine type, and I think we ought to know for the record just what 58602 is.
DR. GRAVATT: Professor Reisner's 58602 that Dr. Diller has been testing so widely is made up from a collection of seed from a number of isolated valleys of the Nanking area. It is rather southern in its native home, but Dr. Diller's tests and other tests have shown that it's hardy up north and it's hardy down south. As some of you have noticed, the nuts are very variable, with a number of different types mixed in together.
Dr. Diller and I have been discussing the question of hybrid vigor. It may be involved that each of these seedlings is a cross between different local strains. We must remember that the foresters have gone into this question of hardiness in great detail. You will find that you can't plant trees in Germany in a certain area unless the parent trees grew in a certain area, with comparable altitude and latitude. Minimum and maximum temperatures and other factors are also taken into consideration.
Pennsylvania started a program along the same line. They have divided their state into about five areas, and in each of those areas they are locating sources of seed that are going to be suited to those areas. They have evidence that many of these Chinese introductions coming from way down south are going to be hardy way up north, but in this matter of hardiness you sometimes have to wait for 50 or 100 years before you are sure of your conclusions.
DR. CRANE: That's right.
The next question I was going to ask these growers in the areas growing chestnuts is how much trouble they have had with hardiness or cold injury to chestnut trees that they have had. Has there been any?
MR. STOKE: I have had none.
MR. SILVIS: We have had none in Massillon.
DR. CRANE: Wilson, how about Georgia?
MR. WILSON: None.
MR. KEPLINGER: Dr. Meader sent me some stock from seed that he brought from near Seoul, Korea in 1947. They are very productive up there at Durham, New Hampshire. I have two trees from seed from these trees. They have much more narrow leaves, than any Chinese chestnuts I have seen so far.
DR. CRANE: Are you sure they are pure Chinese?
DR. MACDANIEL: I am sure they are not. I have seen pictures and had some correspondence with Dr. Meader on them. They seem to be the Japanese species, C. crenata type, or possibly hybrid, not strictly Japanese.
MR. PEASE: I want to throw in something a little bit aside. I think we kid ourselves and the public in assuming, tacitly, that Chinese chestnuts, no matter how narrow the strain, are going to breed true or anywhere near true. Any one lot of seedlings are likely to show great variation in hardiness, disease resistance and other characters. There is a great difference between resistance and immunity. I speak this way because I have seen plenty of people selling Chinese chestnuts who actually believe they are immune, and I have seen customers mad enough to shoot them when they have seen half of them die of blight.
MR. MILLER: When considering hardiness, climate is one thing and air drainage is another. In any climatic zone the exact location or site, particularly air drainage is important. I have my orchard on a southwest slope with perfect air drainage. I have 250-some trees that are six or seven years old growing very nicely, and I have not had any loss, even with English walnut, the Carpathian or any of the other trees. I think that many of us are overlooking the fact that air drainage and location of the orchard is one of the main things. I don't think this has anything to do with the particular seed or the varieties, but I think that is one thing that we must consider.
DR. CRANE: No question about that. Chinese chestnuts are like peaches, and they start pretty early in the spring.
MR. GIBBS: Chinese chestnuts are hardy from Maine to Florida. I think they winter kill because of unhealthy condition of the tree. The place that I did live, at McLean, Virginia, was low in a frosty place, and the first spring they killed back three times before they took off. Where I live now in the Blue Ridge Mountains, which is orchard country, the Chinese chestnut killed back in the spring, but there is nothing the matter with their winter hardiness. They stand winter cold as good as a walnut tree.
DR. GRAVES: I want to make the point that it is in part a question of age, to my mind, as to whether these trees get winter killed. I know we had some trees from the Department of Agriculture, Division of Forest Pathology, back in 1925, and in the very cold winter, 1933-34, they killed back almost to the ground. Again in the severe winter of 1943 Chinese chestnuts were killed. But I feel that when a tree is of good size with its roots down in the ground, it's not so liable to winter kill as are the small seedlings.
DR. CRANE: We have spent enough time on this matter. The question of growing seedlings as compared to grafted trees is up for discussion. Mr. Wilson is a big operator growing chestnuts in Georgia. I would like to have him tell what he thinks of this matter of seedlings versus varieties for nut production.
MR. WILSON: Dr. Crane, I am fully convinced if we ever make an industry out of this chestnut business it's going to have to be based on grafted trees of good varieties. I have one block of approximately 200 grafted trees of Meiling and Kuling. Those trees have a nice crop on this year. They have different age tops, but we have a nice crop of nuts on them. I have another block of some 260 seedlings that were planted in 1948. The crop on these trees, with the same fertilization and cultivation ranges from no nuts to a heavy crop of nuts. You can't have an industry on that kind of yield. There are probably only 30 trees out of 260 that have a paying crop of nuts. That won't go as a paying proposition. You have got to have nuts on all the trees, and I am fully convinced if we ever make an industry out of it, the grower has got to produce nuts. Trees are not enough, he can't sell the tree; he wants to keep his tree. He wants nuts to sell, and you can't get them on the seedling trees. I am fully convinced you can't do it.
DR. MACDANIEL: Have any of your grafts gone bad?
MR. WILSON: I have had no incompatibility, except on one tree. My oldest grafts are four and five years old, top grafted in place on two and three year old seedlings.
DR. CRANE: Mr. Stoke, what is your experience?
MR. STOKE: I have two trees in my yard at home. Dr. Reed gave me credit for doing the first grafting of Mollissima in this country. I don't know whether it's true or not. Those were grafted in '31. They made perfect union, and they are perfect today, and they will be perfect when I am dead and gone. I find no incompatibility between Mollissima and Mollissima. One acre of good, select varieties, grafted, will produce as many nuts as three or four acres of seedlings.
DR. CRANE: Mr. Bernath, how about the situation up in the Hudson Valley?
MR. BERNATH: My trees are of small size. We have some in bearing, but as far as having any difficulty with them or freezing back, we have none.
DR. CRANE: Mr. Snyder, how about the situation out in Iowa?
MR. SNYDER: I am not trying to grow Chinese chestnuts anymore. We have had two different lots from U.S.D.A. and both of them have gone out in the winters sooner or later. We have had nice seedling rows, and Dr. Colby sent over a collection of scions, enough to graft each one. Every one grew. This winter they are all gone. We can grow American chestnuts, but we can't grow the Chinese.
DR. CRANE: Joe, you have had a lot of experience, made a lot of observations of this matter of seedlings versus grafted varieties. What do you think of the situation?
DR. MACDANIEL: I will follow Mr. Stokes' opinion on that. I think grafted trees, if you have a compatible graft, are worth several times as much as average seedling trees. At the University of Illinois most of our trees are seedling trees. We are just getting started with grafted Chinese chestnuts.
DR. CRANE: That's the way it is with us. Anybody in the audience that has an opinion that they think seedlings are better than grafted trees?
MR. CALDWELL: I was going to say seedlings are better, but I think this is one thing everybody should realize: The emphasis has been based on early production. In many cases we have found in forest trees that early seed production doesn't necessarily mean heavy late seed production. Some of those that didn't produce early went ahead and 40 or 50 years later produced heavily. So be a little bit careful when you start swinging too heavily on early production.
DR. CRANE: Yes, but, Dr. Caldwell, we in the United States haven't time to wait. We haven't time to wait.
MR. CALDWELL: You are going to have to take it.
DR. CRANE: It's just like Mr. Wilson said. He planted seedlings in 1948, and he is telling me that most of them haven't come into bearing, so he is going to ply the axe or top work them. He hasn't time to wait. He's got to make his bread and butter out of that, and when it comes to growing nuts, we can't wait 40 or 50 years for a tree to come in. That might be all right for posterity, but we have got to be sure of it, or our posterity is not going to be able to pay the national debt.
DR. MACDANIELS: According to the experience I have had, the chestnut is only a little more hardy than the peach, and behaves pretty much the same as regards wood injury. At 30 deg. below zero the trees have been killed outright or to the ground. At about 25 deg. below they will black heart with killing of sapwood and serious injury to the bark. At 20 they will survive. This experience involves perhaps 125 seedling trees from various sources, but mostly from the U.S.D.A. It is quite likely that there may be more hardier strains that will withstand these low temperatures. The other point is the matter of grafted trees. It is my opinion that the failure of the graft is a form of cold injury related to delayed maturity of the tissues at the graft union. Certainly failure of grafts is much more persistent in the north than in the south.
My experience has been that I haven't been able to keep grafted trees.
They appear to thrive for three or four years and then die. I have tried
it over and over again. It appears that the grafted tree in Georgia and
Virginia is one thing. In New York it's another.
MR. WALLICK: I have never bought a grafted chestnut tree that grew. They all die. And seedlings mostly do not have the kind of nuts you want. Also they may be susceptible to disease.
DR. MCKAY: I want to make one observation about our experience at Beltsville on the question of seedlings versus varieties as regards bearing. We topworked scions of some of our good varieties, like Nanking and Meiling, onto large seedlings we have at Beltsville that are poor bearers. These grafted portions in the top of these trees under poor conditions—our soil is poor at Beltsville—set tremendously heavy crops, but the nuts are smaller in size than normal, and therefore the crop is not as desirable as it would be if it were grown under good conditions. The point is that those varieties bear even under poor conditions. Bearing is a variety characteristic, and wherever it grows it will bear though it may not produce a good-sized nut.
MR. PEASE: I believe what's coming out in this discussion on bearing is also true in hardiness, growth, and any characteristic we want. We may select seeds from trees at an elevation of 6,000 feet, and still have some which will be not hardy.
DR. CRANE: That's right.
MR. SILVIS: I'd like to make a point. If in your observation you find a tree seedling in your locality that is producing good crops plant that. Don't get one from Georgia. We can take a little bit of advice from the fruit grower, and not plant too much from the south, even though it came from China.
DR. GRAVATT: I'd like to Comment about conditions in Europe with reference to seedlings and varieties. The general practice there is for each little farmer to graft from the best variety in his section, especially in Italy where you find hundreds of varieties.
In Portugal we were all very much impressed with one area where the government has had an active program in persuading the chestnut owners to topwork all their trees to three varieties. These varieties are very good ones, and they are getting a very greatly increased price on account of the high quality and uniformity of the nuts they export.
It seems to me that in the discussion on the Chinese chestnut in this country we have done a little bit of injustice to the seedlings, so far as the discussion has gone. I am in perfect agreement with what's been said about the low production the first few years, but over on the Eastern Shore Mr. Hemming's trees are producing just about as much in the way of a crop as the tree can bear, and the grafted varieties there don't produce any more than his 17 or 18 seedlings.
DR. MACDANIEL: I believe Hemming has some exceptional seedlings in that lot.
DR. GRAVATT: Yes, they are very valuable, don't misunderstand me. After the first ten years you may find a seedling orchard is going to produce a very good crop, tree by tree. We have had a lot of experience, similar to that reported in New York, with grafted trees dying. We get seedling trees dying, too, but I agree that there is more damage from fall freezes, spring freezes and perhaps from straight low temperature winter injury with the grafted trees than with the seedling trees. Furthermore, I am very critical of the tactics of some of the nurseries. They have grafted on seedlings of absolutely unknown origin or mixed origin. They will take a South Chinese variety and graft it on seedlings that for hundreds of years have been grown in North China. That's just inviting trouble. The nearer you can get to having seedling and scion from the same climatic origin, the better off you are. In fact, we have advised growers to get seedlings of the Nanking and graft Nanking on them.
Dr. McKay is doing a lot of good, basic research work on this problem, and he will have more information for us in times to come. I am firmly convinced that we are going to come some day to the grafted chestnuts, especially in the South, because a lot of the southern producers right now are giving a black eye to Chinese chestnuts, because they are shipping lots of mixed nuts, and by the time they get to the consumer half of them are rotten. This will ruin the market. We have been buying some six or seven thousand pounds of nuts to ship to Italy, and we know something about the conditions of nuts when they reach us. There is no quicker way of killing a market than to be shipping in a whole lot of nuts that are going to spoil or are in the process of spoiling when they reach the consumer. Grafted varieties are one way of getting away from this, especially in the South.
MR. WILSON: I am far enough south so that in peach production we often have winters so warm that the trees don't wake up. This question of rest period is quite important with us. We have a warm winter, and the Mayflower peach just keeps on sleeping. Eventually bloom will break, and a little peach will sit up there waiting for the leaf to come out. There is apparently a rest period with the Chinese chestnut there also. The time of breaking of the rest period in my seedling trees varies as much as three to four weeks, and that would lead me to believe that, in the long run, we will have to plant locally adapted varieties.
PRESIDENT BEST: I am sorry that we have to stop this very interesting discussion.
At this time is there any item of general interest to the group that anyone would like to bring up?
MR. MILLER: For sometime I have been considering the desirability of changing the name of the Northern Nut Growers. I am inclined to think that maybe some of our southern friends or from the Far West or Southwest would be a little dubious of joining the Northern Nut Growers, because they think we are perhaps exclusive for the north tier of states and we didn't want them.
I thought perhaps the International Nut Growers, or the United States Nut Growers Association were names worth considering. I think that would have a desirable psychological effect on our membership. We are a big organization, and I think a lot of people would think it was a whole lot larger if the name would imply that. I think the "Northern Nut Growers" just looks like we are concerned with the northern tier of states, and I think we would do a whole lot better by changing the name. I would like to have some suggestions. Possibly, it could be American Nut Growers.
MR. KERR: Mr. Chairman, I am a charter member of the American Farm
Bureau, and that goes over big. It's a real success as an organization,
and I think the American Nut Growers—take in South America and North
America—would hit our proposition about right.
PRESIDENT BEST: All right, is there another suggestion? We mustn't take so much time on this, but it is mighty important.
MR. BECKER: My final opinion is that it's best to leave it as it was.
MR. STOKE: It seems to me that this matter was well decided some time ago. We have certain definite problems to work out. I think we had better stay on those problems and work them out before we spread over the whole universe. We will have too many other problems coming in our lap.
MR. DAVIDSON: That matter was taken up some five or six years ago, and for the reason that Mr. Stoke mentioned, the fact that we have special problems and the very difficult problems that don't concern southerners was the reason for voting that proposition down before. I think it would be better, at least, for us to consider the matter rather thoroughly before we vote on it, maybe postpone it until another year.
DR. MACDANIELS: It just occurs to me that the Northern Nut Growers Association was formed to tackle problems that weren't being covered anywhere else. There are other local organizations which are concerned with the Persian walnut and the Northwest Filbert and the Southern Pecan. The Northern Nut Growers Association was organized to save America's nut heritage, as somebody said, in a rather restricted area. Possibly the time has come to get into a larger organization with a greater scope, but I will say with Mr. Davidson that we want to consider very carefully what the gain or loss might be for the change in emphasis.
PRESIDENT BEST: Would someone make the suggestion here that we keep this thing in mind for a year and maybe at our next meeting take a little time to discuss it thoroughly.
DR. CRANE: I'd like to make a few remarks and offer a motion. I believe I am correct as to the history of the organization when I state that the oldest nut growers' organization was the old National Nut Growers Association, and that covered the nut interests of the country of all kinds. Then out of that came the National Pecan Growers Association, and almost at the same time, the Northern Nut Growers Association. The old National Nut Growers Association folded up, as did the National Pecan Growers Association. They were victims of the depression. I think we could discuss this at great length and not get anywhere, and therefore I make the motion that the president appoint a committee of three members to study the possibilities, both advantages and disadvantages of a change in the name of the association and report back to the association their recommendations at the next meeting.
(Motion seconded.)
PRESIDENT BEST: The motion has been made and seconded that we appoint a committee to handle this thing and report back to us. Is there any discussion?
DR. GRAVATT: I'd like to point out that research work is being started in Europe that is going to be very valuable to us. They are now working on the Chinese chestnuts on a very large scale, starting in Yugoslavia, France, Switzerland, and they are already doing quite a bit of breeding work in Spain and Portugal along these lines. The things that they develop, will be Chinese chestnut hybrids so they are going to have the same problems in Europe working with the chestnuts that we have here. In the past they have been working entirely with the European chestnut. I think we are now on a basis whereby the European growers can feel that they can profit by taking our publication, and, that both continents will benefit.
DR. GRAVES: Do you put that as an argument for changing our name to
American Nut Growers?
DR. GRAVATT: I don't think "American" would help at all. And, furthermore, when you talk about "American", a lot of people think of South America.
MR. SLATE: It's what the members get out of the proceedings and meetings that brings them in and keeps them, it's not the name of the organization.
DR. MACDANIEL: Mr. President, as former state vice-president in Alabama, Florida and Tennessee, I don't believe the change of name would result in any great immediate increase in membership in the Southeast.
PRESIDENT BEST: Now, are you ready for the question?
(The question was called for, and carried unanimously.)
Development of the Nut Industry in the Midwest
J. F. WILKINSON, Rockport, Ind.
The development of the northern nut tree industry in the midwest really began about 1910. Prior to that time W. C. Reed and son of Vincennes, Indiana had done some experimental work with the Indiana and Busseron varieties of pecan, as they had located these two parent trees. E. A. Riehl of Godfrey, Illinois had been experimenting with the walnut and chestnut, and it was at this time that T. P. Littlepage, R. L. McCoy and established our nurseries here in southern Indiana.
We then began the search for the best parent trees for propagation in the midwest.
We located Warrick, Hoosier, Major, Greenriver, Posey, Kentucky, Butterick and several other varieties most of which have since been discarded.
A number of varieties have since been introduced, by Messrs. Gerardi, Whitford, Snyder, Burkhart, Bolten, and others who are either nurserymen or propagators, of pecan, walnut, hickory and chestnut.
The Littlepage and McCoy nurseries were discontinued about thirty years ago though I have continued the search for new and better varieties, and several years ago located, named, and introduced the Giles pecan, in southeast Kansas which is proving very satisfactory. I have recently located, named, and am now introducing a new variety, CHIEF, from Illinois. This is the largest northern pecan that I have ever seen and it promises to be an outstanding variety.
In the territory from southern Indiana to eastern Kansas are countless thousands of native pecan trees in the valleys of the Ohio, Mississippi and Missouri rivers and their tributaries.
On the uplands in this same territory, the black walnut is found almost everywhere. Thousands of pecan and walnut are of suitable size for top-working and could be made valuable by being grafted over to these fine varieties. These may be found in any quantity from a single tree to a native grove (especially pecan) of thousands of trees.