VoS 



circulatino- air is used to doubly hasten tlie curing process, but this 

 practice is to be discouraged as too often tlie undue heating of the nut 

 germ while in this stage of ripening injures it, and thus the nuts are 

 rendered unfit for reproduction. The nuts in the trays should be fre- 

 quently stirred or turned over during the first M'eek or ten days while 

 curing. 



In the case of chestnuts, the crop should be harvested as soon as 

 possible after the first nuts fall so that the damage from weevils may 

 be kept at a mininumi. Immediately after the nuts are surface-dried 

 they should be treated to an aj^plication of carbon disulphide, one 

 ounce to a tightly closed capacity content of an apple barrel; time of 

 treatment about 24 hours. While this treatment probably will not kill 

 all the weevils it will insure a much larger percentage of germination 

 than there would be otherwise. 



After fumigating the nuts should be spread out on wire-cloth bot- 

 tom trays and placed under a shed or trees, where a free circulation 

 of air will in a few days sufficiently cure the nuts, so that they may 

 be stratified and set away in a pit in the ground on the north side of 

 a building, wall, hedge-row or evergreen trees, thus insuring them 

 ample moisture and protection against sudden changes of temperatures 

 and the ravages of rodents and other pests. 



Other nuts of the temperate zone may, in a general way, be treated 

 without any sj^ecial care other than that required to keep them from 

 getting moist and warm, or destroyed by rodents or other nut-eating 

 animals, or by fungous troubles. 



On the whole probably the best method of treatment for the ama- 

 teur or small grower of seedling nut trees, is to stratify the nuts as 

 soon as harvested, assuming 'that the nuts have been fairly well cured 

 by a few days' exj^osure to drying air currents. 



Stratification consists in layering the nuts in clean, sharp sand, 

 light loam or sawdust and placing them in a cold, moist place, as a 

 well drained and shaded north hillside, where their contact with the 

 soil and protection from the direct rays of the sun will insure com- 

 plete dormancy and at the same time prevent the developm.ent of 

 fungous troubles. To this end the common practice is to dig a some- 

 what shallow trench and place in it, one layer deep, the "flats" in which 

 the nuts are stratified. The flat usually employed is a shallow, wooden 

 box in which the bottom is provided with ample, narrow drainage 

 cracks and the top covered with wire cloth that will keep out mice or 



