128 PRACTICAL ARBORICULTURE 
Still more wasteful was the practice in the valley of the Kansas and 
Marais des Cygnes Rivers, in Kansas, where walnut and oak logs of giant size 
were rolled into the fence rows and thus used as barricades against stock, it 
being too much labor to split them into rails and build fences. 
Walnut was very abundant in the valleys of Eastern Kansas, yet, but a 
dozen miles away there were treeless prairies of great extent, which were at 
an early day considered as part of the Great American Desert, but which now 
are highly cultivated. It was thought no lumber would ever be required to 
improve this “desert” region. 
The walnut was distributed over a great extent of territory, but never 
existed in exclusive forest, but always in mixed woods, owing to the method 
of its distribution by Indians who camped in old woods. 
Grown in fence corners or open field, away from other trees, the walnut 
becomes a low-spreading tree, with a minimum of sawing lumber in the trunk. 
The same may be said of many other forest trees. 
But when grown moderately close the timber becomes tall, upright and 
free from branches to great height. 
This does not prove that the nuts should be planted with a wheat drill. 
PLANTING THE NUTS. 
Trees may be too close together as well as too far apart; both extremes 
should be avoided. We think 7x7 feet a good distance at first, thinning as 
becomes necessary. 
For the improvement of small growth forests, and where the trees are of 
slight value, the walnut may be introduced to advantage. 
Presuming the second growth of such woodlands to be dense enough to 
keep down grasses, and to give some forest conditions, the nuts may be 
planted with some system among the standing wood. 
A hole may be made with the mattock, three or four inches deep, a nut 
dropped in and the earth covered over it with the foot. This is the simplest 
and quickest method in such cases. 
The young plant is very hardy, and being crowded by the surrounding 
brush will shoot upward without side branches. In a few vears the walnut 
will occupy the land, destroying slower growths. 
The importance of changing the character of the wood growths through- 
out a very large portion of our country is not sufficiently appreciated. Mil- 
lions of acres which are covered with scrub growths ranging from ten to 
thirty feet height, and of no commercial value, give the appearance of a forest, 
and in theoretical estimates are classed as timbered areas, causing the false 
impression that we have vast areas of valuable forests still remaining. These 
inferior growths do not produce an income for the owners or a revenue for 
the State. 
By introducing the walnut, and other valuable trees of greater stature and 
higher financial importance, these low-valued tracts may be brought up to a 
much higher standard. For instance: 
