386 



ARBORICULTURE 



with what they have been planting. 



At the same time sundry parties in 

 Kansas and Nebraska collected 25,000 

 pounds (five hundred million of seeds) 

 w^hich vv^as sold to nurserymen, seed 

 dealers and individuals, and this has 

 produced fully 100,000,000 trees. 



Responsible parties purchased several 

 hundred samples of this Catalpa seed, 

 of a score of dealers and collectors, 

 almost the entire lot of w^hich was big- 

 nonoides, kempferii and various hybrid 

 seeds. Scarcely a sample show^ed speci- 

 osa characteristics. 



Until the public and especially the 

 seed dealers and nurserymen learn to 

 distinguish these various sorts of catal- 

 pa, and cease collecting seed and grow^- 

 ing trees of worthless varieties, it will be 

 uphill vs^ork endeavoring to teach the 

 w^orld the value of genuine catalpa 

 speciosa. 



Now about the section of w^ood. It is 

 a very common disease of the bignon- 

 oides catalpa, w^hich I have seldom 

 found in speciosa. There seems to be 

 less of the antiseptic materials in the sap 

 of bignonoides and its hybrids than in 

 speciosa. 



When an injury occurs to this variety 

 during the growing season, the sap is so 

 diluted that the antiseptic constituents 

 are insufficient to repair the wound or 

 prevent spores of fungus growths from 

 entering the wound and following that 



downward through the heart of the tree. 



In this case the trees had stood 

 8 '4x8^4 f«et for tw^enty-three years. It 

 is apparent that 68 square feet surface is 

 not sufficient to maintain a healthy tree 

 grow^th for thirty years nor even fifteen 

 years, and it is largely due to this over- 

 crowding and consequent suppression 

 of growth, w^hich has caused the dis- 

 eased condition of this grove. 



The Farlington, Kansas, grove was 

 closer planted, 4x4 feet, and so remained 

 for thirty years. Of course the trees 

 never made saw logs at such distance, 

 yet in the entire grove there was no dis- 

 ease. The Farlington grove w^as of 

 catalpa speciosa. 



Future Treatment: The stumps 

 w^ill reproduce the grove and in about 

 seven years the owmer can supply the 

 neighborhood w^ith fence posts. After 

 cutting the second time there vv^ill still 

 be sufficient vitality to produce another 

 crop in the same time. 



No pruning need be done -with the 

 grove, and if any of the groves in Kan- 

 sas are speciosa there w^ill be little 

 pruning, simply removing superflous 

 low^er branches and to avoid double 

 trunks. 



There is no such thing as sun scald of 

 Catalpa, especially in a grove planted so 

 closely as to prevent the sun from reach- 

 ing the trunks of the tree. 







