;tQ: ! NUT CULTURE IN THE UNITED STATES. 



localities where there are no fruiting specimens of the species that he contemplates 

 growing, the planter first seek experience by planting a few trees rather than a large 

 number. 



The ordinary commercial grower will not be justified in incurring the expense of 

 the experiment until he has a choice variety with which to begin. No seed can be 

 depended upon to give a nut identical in character with the one planted. The varia- 

 tion in seedlings, due to cross fertilization and the inherent tendency to vary, is as 

 marked in many kinds of nut trees as in other wild or little-cultivated fruits. If it 

 is not safe to depend solely upon the planting of peach stones to produce orchards 

 of trees bearing good peaches, is it not less safe to depend solely upon seedling nut 

 trees in planting orchards that will take three times as long under ordinary conditions 

 to reach bearing age? In view of the importance of this phase of the subject, a special 

 effort has been made to determine in what particular, if any, the budding and grafting 

 of nut trees differ from the budding and grafting of ordinary fruits. A discussion of 

 general methods of propagation will be found, and under the head of each species 

 requiring special treatment a summary is given of the experience of propagators who 

 have done experimental work with trees of the species discussed. 



NUKSERY AND ORCHARD. 



For stocks upon which to build an orchard or nursery seedlings of the same or of 

 some closely allied species are necessary. Such seedlings may sometimes be obtained 

 in the forests, but ordinarily they are cheaper and more satisfactory when grown 

 under nursery treatment. In belief and practice leading growers do not agree as to 

 the best method to be followed in establishing nut orchards. Some advise the growing 

 of some species in the nursery rows until they begin to bear; some advocate leaving 

 the trees in nursery rows but one, two, or three years; while others insist that the 

 nuts should be planted where the trees are to remain, so that all transplanting may 

 be avoided. 



Between the extreme practices of leaving trees in the nursery rows until they 

 come to fruitage and the planting of the germinating nut on the spot where the tree 

 is intended to grow there is a broad field for experiment. Somewhere between these 

 extremes the accepted practice of the future will probably be developed. 



The advocates of the nursery period of long duration claim for their method (1) 

 greater ease and less expense of cultivation of young trees in the nursery row than 

 in the orchard; (2) less liability to injury of the trees during such cultivation by 

 ordinary farm help; (3) increased facility of cropping the contemplated orchard site 

 without the presence of small trees, and the consequent increased profit from such 

 cropping; (4) a more uniform stand of orchard growth when the plantation first comes 

 into bearing. 



Those who advocate planting the nuts where the trees are to stand base their 

 views mainly on the belief that it is necessary to retain the taproot system of the 

 tree. They hold that when the natural deep-root system is retained the tree is more 

 hardy and lives to a greater age than it would if its roots were shortened by trans- 

 planting. It has not been demonstrated by experiment, however, that within the 

 ordinary life of a thrifty tree grown by either method there is any perceptible differ- 

 ence in the aggregate product of nuts. 



It is commonly believed of all fruits that cultivation hastens and increases fruit 

 bearing; also that checking limb or root growth within certain limits, as by pruning, 

 will effect these results. It is known that fruits have not only been materially modi- 

 fied in size, color, and flavor by the influence of cultivation and an increased food 

 supply, but that such influence also extends to the habit of growth of the roots and 

 branches. Experiment alone can determine whether a severed taproot is to any 

 extent a cause of earlier or greater fruitfuluess of the tree; what effect this change of 



