64 



412 YEARBOOK OF THE DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE. 



planted was secured is not known. The variety appears to have been 

 first propagated by Mr. William Nelson, who took scions from the tree 

 about 1882, and it was first catalogued by Richard Frotscher in 1885 

 under the name "Rome." About 1883, the late Emil Bourgeois, of 

 Central, La., secured scions from the original tree and top-grafted some 

 seedling trees at his home on Rapidan plantation in the same parish. 

 There it was christened "Pride of the Coast," and soon thereafter 

 Mr. Bourgeois began its propagation in nursery under that name. 

 This variety yields the largest nuts of any yet brought to notice, and 

 has therefore been the subject of deliberate renaming by nurserymen 

 and seedsmen more frequently than any other. This accounts for the 

 diversity and number of its synonyms. 



The original tree of the Rome is still standing in the Rome garden 

 at Convent, La. It has been in a state of decrepitude for several 

 years, and now yields but light crops of nuts, many of which have 

 imperfect kernels. 



DESCRIPTION. 



Size variable, large to very large, 40 to 55 nuts per pound, selected 

 samples running as large as 25 per pound; form oblong or cylindrical 

 oval, tapering gradually to the wedge-shaped apex; color grayish, 

 often heavily splashed and spattered with purplish black over most of 

 the surface; shell thick, hard; partitions thick;' cracking quality poor; 

 kernel often shrunken or entirely "false;" color bright, texture 

 rather coarse and dry; flavor fair, quality good when plump and well 

 filled, but usually quite indifferent. 



The Rome tree is an erect, fairly strong grower, with rather stout 

 bluish-green young wood. It occasionally bears large crops, but is 

 erratic in this respect, and at most points where it has been tested a 

 large proportion of the kernels are defective. Aside from the fact 

 that a portion of the crop is of extraordinary size, there is little to 

 commend it to the planter. 



The specimens illustrated on. Plate LVII were grown by Paul E. 

 Bourgeois, Central, La. 



RUSSELL PECAN. 



[PLATE LVII.] 



The Russell pecan tree, like all others at Ocean Springs, Miss. , was 

 grown from planted nuts, that locality being below the native range 

 of the species in that section. This tree was one of a lot of seedlings 

 grown by the late Col. W. R. Stuart, of Ocean Springs, Miss. , about 

 1875, from nuts secured by him from James Moore, a blacksmith of 

 that village. The exact source from which Moore secured the nuts 

 is not known. Colonel Stuart sold five of these seedling trees to 

 Peter Madsen, who planted them in his garden, now the property of 



