14 



HARDWOOD RECORD 



AMERICAN FOREST TREES. 



Black Walnut. 



Jitgla a — Linn. 



Blaek walnut is of the family Juglandacew 



and belonging to the same group as the 



English or royal walnut and the California 



walnut. 



The range of growth of the black walnut 

 is from southern Ontario to Florida, central 

 Alabama and Mississippi, and westward 

 through southern Michigan, Wiscon- 

 sin and Minnesota to Nebraska, 

 Kansas and the San Antonio river 

 district of Texas. 



By its common English name of 

 black walnut this tree is commonly 

 known in most sections of the Uni- 

 ted States, but in parts of New 

 York, Delaware. West Virginia, 

 Florida, Kentucky, Missouri, Ohio. 

 Indiana and Iowa, it is called wal- 

 nut, and in the foreign trade it is 

 often referred to as American wal- 

 nut. Dent-soo-kwa-no-ne was the 

 picturesque title attached to black 

 walnut by the aborigines of New- 

 York state. In shape the tree is 

 rounded, with very thick branches. 

 It attains a height of from 50 to 

 150 feet, and its time of bloom is 

 in April and May, and the fruit 

 matures i" October. 



The hark is blackish, rough and 

 broadly ridged. The twigs are pubes- 

 cent. The leaves are compound, 

 alternate, with stalks from one t" 

 two feet long which are slightly 

 pubescent; odd-pinnate, with from 

 thirteen to twenty-three leaflets; 

 ovate-lanceolate; taper pointed apex 

 and rounded or slightly cordate at 

 the base, the sides being often un- 

 equal, and the lower pair of leaf- 

 lets smaller than the others; sharply 

 toothed; yellowish-green above and 

 glabrous ; paler below and pubes- 

 cent. The fruit is large, globose 

 and solitary; the husk greenish-yel- 

 low, when ripe, and dotted with 

 brownish red ; spongy and decaying 

 to release the nut. The nut is 

 Mack, deeply and sharply furrowed, 

 and contains a rich, highly flavored 

 kernel. 



For many centuries black walnut 

 has been a favorite for many urti- 

 of commerce in European coun- 

 tries. The English walnut, J&g 

 regia, a native of Persia, was the 

 only available species until tin introduction 

 abroad of the nearly similar black walnut of 

 North America, which occurred about the 

 moldle of the seventeenth century. In Eng- 

 land and on the continent as oak first gave 

 way to soft woods tor construction, so it also 

 ut Em cabinet pur- 

 poses. The wood soon became very fashion- 

 able and high prices were paid lor it. 



EIGHTH PAPER 



In the United States at an early date, 

 black walnut was but slightly esteemed, and 

 ■e was confined very largely to the mak- 

 ing of hewn barn frames, and by reason 

 of the ease with which it could be split and 

 its great durability when exposed to the 

 «catlcr, was a favorite material for the 

 building of worm fences. It was even after 

 the in -i valuable portion of the black wal- 



I 1 1 1 : LARGEST BLACK WALNUT TREE l.N THE WORLD, 

 JACKSOS COUNTY, MISSOURI, 7 FEET IN DIAMETER. 



nut area in every accessible portion of the 

 United States had been badly denuded that 

 the high physical qualities of the wood came 

 to be appreciated in its own land. During 

 tie period from 1860 to 1880, black walnut 

 became the < xtreme vogue for furniture manu- 

 facturing purposes within the United States. 

 It was only when the scarcity of the wood 

 in its well-known sources of supply became 



apparent and the price reached a figure that 

 manufacturers regarded as prohibitory, that 

 the furniture fashion of this country changed 

 to very large extent to other woods. This 

 abandonment of a notoriously valuable cabinet 

 wood did not prevail abroad. The foreigner 

 was willing and has been willing at all times, 

 to pay the price for a wood of whose sterling 

 qualities he is well informed. The result has 

 been that for the past twenty-five 



years, the best logs of American 



Mack walnut, which have been ob- 

 tained from remote and heretofore 

 inaccessible sections of the coun- 

 try, have been carefully prepared 

 for export and shipped abroad, 

 there to be manufactured with a 

 minimum of waste, tor the use of 

 lie expert cabinet maker. This de- 

 mand for American walnut is still 

 maintained in nearly all parts of 

 Great Britain, France, Germany, 

 Austro-Ilungary, Denmark, Sweden, 

 Russia, Netherlands, Spain and 

 Italy, but the chief customer for the 



"I is that section of liermany, of 



which Hamburg is the chief com- 

 mercial center. 



The finest black walnut that ever 

 grew within the United States was 



tained in a scattering growth 



throughout the forests of Indiana, 

 Ohio, southern Illinois and Missouri, 

 although a considerable quantity of 

 the wood of exceptional quality was 

 found in New York, Pennsylvania. 

 Maryland, Virginia and West Vir- 

 ginia. Today the remaining stands 

 of walnut of high commercial 

 .ihie that remain within the 

 United States, are in the Indian 

 Territory, Arkansas, Missouri, east- 

 ern Kansas. Kentucky, and a lit- 

 tle in Tennessee. 



Black walnut timber never grows 

 in a forest by itself, but is inter- 

 mingled with oak, syeamore, ash 

 and elm of the middle temperate 

 ne of this continent. 



Tie height of blaek walnut pro- 

 duction was attained in the Unite, I 

 states about 1875, when the total 

 output aggregated approximately 

 -.000,000 feet. Notwithstanding 



the fact that in 1880 the furniture 

 manufacturers of the United States 

 concluded that black walnut was ex 

 iausted as a commercial quantity. 

 the country today produces approximately 

 an avi ragi of 40,000,000 feet annually, of 

 which about l'ii.000,000 feet, notably of the 

 - ' grades, cut from the smaller logs, 

 nsumed by home demand and the re- 

 mainder goes abroad. Approximately fifteen 

 percent of the choicest walnut logs obtained 

 at present are exported to Hamburg, 

 An English authority states that the nuts 



