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NUT TREES SUITABLE FOR THE CHESAPEAKE COUNTRY 



By J. Russell Smith, Professor of Economic Geography, Columbia 



University 



But for the natural modest}' of the people of this Peninsula I 

 should insist that their country was a good piece of country in general 

 and especially adapted for the nut luisiness. However, I nuist mention 

 its relative frost immunity, its good rainfall, and its easy tillage. The 

 land is ready and the trees are ready. There are at least seven species 

 of nnts, most of them with many varieties and hybrids, now ready for 

 commercial growing on the Eastern Shore. These seven nuts are the 

 American black walnut, the hickory, northern pecan, Japanese wal- 

 nut, the filbert, the hazelnut, and the English walnut. 



1. The Black Walnut — I mention it first because it is absolutely 

 native and absolutely adj usted to the climate. We have a natural yearn- 

 ing for the far-fetched but the well tried is far safer. I also mentioned 

 the black walnut first because it seems without doubt to have the largest 

 potential market. It is the cooking nut of the future. It carries its 

 flavor through the oven as no other nut does and in the present and 

 coming era of machinery and factory-made food products, walnut cake, 

 walnut ice cream, and walnut candy give the black walnut a bigger 

 field than the dessert nut market which is now so nearly monopolized 

 by the English or Persian walnut and the salted almond. 



Several varieties of grafted black walnut trees are available in the 

 number of some thousands in commercial nurseries, and the nursery- 

 men can be depended upon to scratch hard to keep up with a larger 

 demand if one develops. 



2. The Hickory Nut — Several species of hickory are at home in 

 this peninsula. As the hickories hybridize quite freely, there are now 

 dozens of hybrid or pure strain hickories ready for commercial propa- 

 gation. Just at present the demand is ahead of the supply, but nur- 

 serymen can be depended on to right that in a short time. 



If any one has some cut-over timber land containing hickory sprouts 

 ready for grafting he can start grafting them himself in place. This is 



