ON PAPER-SHELL WALNUTS 



and a nut that was practically without a protecting 

 shell. 



One of the thin-shelled new walnuts was intro- 

 duced under the name of the Santa Rosa Soft- 

 Shell. It was produced by the usual method of 

 selective breeding, and in producing it of course 

 other qualities were in mind besides the thinness 

 of shell. In particular, selection was made for 

 early and abundant bearing, whiteness and pal- 

 atability of meat, and absence of tannin it being 

 tannin which gives the brown color and bitter 

 taste to the older or ordinary walnuts. The per- 

 fected Santa Rosa may be depended upon to give 

 more than twice as large a crop as the best speci- 

 mens of the France variety of walnuts, known as 

 the Franquette. 



It should be explained, however, that there are 

 two varieties of the Santa Rosa Soft-Shell. One 

 blooms with the ordinary walnut trees, while the 

 other, like the Franquette, blooms two weeks later, 

 generally escaping the frosts that sometimes affect 

 the early bloomer. In producing the new soft- 

 shell, I inspected nuts of the ordinary walnut from 

 many sources. There is great variation among 

 these nuts, and I found some that were almost 

 entirely without shells. One seedling had nuts 

 with the meats half exposed; that is, with shell 

 covering a portion of its surface, suggesting the 



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