198 UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA EXPERIMENT STATION. 



and forth by machinery so that the smaller nuts drop through, and all 

 sizes are carried automatically on to belts which elevate them into bins 

 for drying and storage. In some houses artificial drying is resorted to 

 at this point, since in a moist climate or in wet weather the nuts may 

 become moldy and discolored before drying. More or less grading for 

 quality is done after the nuts leave the bleach by picking out discolored 

 or otherwise objectionable nuts by hand at some convenient point in the 

 operation. The nuts which are simply discolored, but still contain 

 good meats, are sometimes run through the bleach a second time and 

 considerably improved in appearance. From the final bins the nuts 

 are drawn off into large sacks containing about 100 pounds each for 

 shipment to market. 



WALNUT GRADES. 



The commercial grades of walnuts commonly made in California are 

 as follows: "Budded," No. 1 Soft Shells, No. 2 Soft Shells, No. 1 and 

 No. 2 "Standards" or "Hard Shells," "Paper Shells" and culls. The 

 term budded walnuts, as commonly applied in the trade, includes the 

 Placentia Perfection, or nuts of equally good appearance graded over 

 a screen one and three sixteenths inch square mesh. Into this class 

 go all the good-sized nuts of any desirable variety which is worthy of 

 propagation by budding or grafting. These usually command a pre- 

 mium of two or three cents per pound over the best of the ordinary 

 nuts. The terms Soft Shell, Hard Shell and Paper Shell are of rather 

 uncertain meaning so far as the thickness of the shell is concerned. 

 As a matter of fact, very few or no No. 1 Hard Shells go on to the 

 market, but almost any good-sized nut is classed as a Soft Shell. 



"Hard Shell" and "Paper Shell," so far as they have any definite 

 meaning, refer commonly in southern California to certain types or 

 varieties of trees rather than to nuts of a particular thickness of shell. 

 "Hard Shell" means commonly the old-fashioned walnut of the first 

 California plantings, which is a tree of quite characteristic type. The 

 bark is of decidedly whitish color, the general form of the tree rather 

 stocky and compact, while the nut is small, quite round and decidedly 

 hard-shelled. The tree is less thrifty and more inclined to die-back 

 and deterioration than the prevailing type of the soft-shell tree. Com- 

 paratively few of these typical hard-shell trees now remain in the 

 southern California groves. Any good nut of desirable size and shape 

 goes on the market as a soft-shell, regardless of its actual cracking 

 quality, so that extreme thinness of shell is not a necessary or even a 

 desirable quality. Any good-sized, slightly elongated nut is decidedly 

 better from a commercial standpoint for having a comparatively hard, 

 not easily opened shell, since such nuts stand handling better and are 

 also less liable to the trouble called perforation, which we describe else- 

 where. 



