The Bulletin. 27 



be very fertile with the flowers of other trees, and vice versa. Some 

 of our choicest varieties of fruit are almost completely sterile when 

 placed alone or in solid orchard blocks of their own variety, while 

 they are heavy producers in mixed-variety plantations. It is very 

 probably true that this same phenomenon will account for the bar- 

 renness of some pecan trees. It has been pointed out by Professor 

 Hume, in his admirable work on "The Pecan and Its Culture," 

 that since the male catkins are naked and exposed during their de- 

 velopment, they are more liable to be frosted than the pistillate blooms 

 which come out later in a protecting cluster of leaves. This accounts 

 in a large measure for the nonsetting of fruit in high altitudes and 

 on the northern boundaries of the pecan area. In a mixed plantation 

 it might be possible for a variety on which the stamens had been 

 frosted to produce fruit by being fertilized by later blooming varieties. 

 When the characteristics of pecan varieties have been fully worked 

 out, as they have been with our more domesticated fruits, it is very 

 probable that the undesirable reputation which the pecan now 

 possesses for unfruitfulness and late and shy bearing will in part be 

 dissipated. 



PECANS WILL NOT "COME TRUE." 



In the early days of pecan growing the only way to get trees was 

 by planting nuts. At that time no grafted and budded trees were 

 obtainable. The common practice was to obtain and plant nuts that 

 came from some tree that produced large, thin-shelled nuts. It was 

 naturally to be expected that large, thin-shelled nuts would produce 

 trees bearing the same kind or at least similar nuts. This was where 

 the rub came in, for after waiting patiently for a decade or score 

 of years it was generally found that the much-hoped-for tree bore 

 small, bitter nuts. Such disheartening experiences have forever dis- 

 gusted many people with pecan growing. The pecan will not "come 

 true" from seed ; but neither will the apple, peach or pear or any other 

 of our fruits. Why should any more be expected of the pecan tree ? 



Let us look into the reason of the "not coming true" of our fruits, 

 nuts and other plants. All seeds, whether nuts or otherwise, are 

 the product of breeding. Breeding is the reproductive union of 

 two individuals — one a male, the other a female. If these parent 

 individuals are very much alike, the seeds produced by the daughter 

 plant will resemble those produced by the mother. If the parents 

 are very unlike, the seeds produced by the daughter plant will have 

 every reason to be dissimilar to the parents. The large, thin-shelled 

 nut that was planted with such hope was very probably fertilized 

 with the pollen from a bitter-nut tree (Hicoria aquatica), which is 

 a first cousin of the pecan (Hicoria pecan). The bitter nuts and 

 the pecans cross very readily and give a race of seedlings producing 



