68. FOREST TREES. 
The Pecan tree is found principally, if not exclu- 
sively, upon river bottoms, from Northern Illinois to 
Texas. Itisa stranger to the Atlantic States. It 
most resembles the Bitternut Hickory and will thrive 
in the same soils. On the Illinois river it is found 
as far north as Lacon, und on the Mississippi as high 
as latitude 42.° 
The Pecan grows in the forest to the height of 
sixty or seventy feet. It is a beautiful tree, with a 
straight and well-shaped trunk. Its timber is infe- 
rior to that of some of the species already described, 
but it merits the attention of the cultivator on 
account of the excellence of its fruit. No other nut, 
native or imported, can be compared with it in flavor. 
The shell is thin, the kernel destitute of woody par- 
titions, and easily extracted, By cultivation and the 
selection of superior varieties for propagation, the 
fruit may, undoubtedly, be increased in size, and, 
probably, improved in flavor. Like other Hickories, 
it does not transplant well, and must be removed from 
the seed-bed when one year old. It is said to be tardy 
in coming into bearing, though producing abundantly 
when well grown. This fault may, perhaps, be cor- 
rected by cultivation. 
The nuts of the Pecan tree would be more abun- 
dant in the market but for the practice, worthy only 
of barbarians, of felling the trees, to come at the fruit 
more easily. This was extensively done along the 
Illinois river when [I first settled in the west forty 
years since, It is said that the same vandalism is still 
perpetrated where it can be done with impunity. 
