THIRTY-FOURTH FRUIT-GROWERS ' C0N\T:NTI0N. 



27 



perpetuate these desirable varieties by planting walnuts from these par- 

 ticularly desirable trees. However, if they had taken scions from these 

 trees instead of planting walnuts from them, and grafted them on to 

 some desirable stock, they would have perpetuated in nearly every 

 detail all of the desirable characteristics which they wish to perpetuate 

 in their new orchard ; whereas in planting seedling walnuts from these 

 old trees, they were simply getting another seedling orchard, which 

 would in very few respects be superior or even equal to the old orchard. 



There may be a possibility tliat out of one hundred walnuts planted 

 from some desirable tree there would be five or six trees which would 

 be equal to the parent tree ; probably two or three which would in 

 some respects be better : whereas ninety-five per cent of the trees would 

 in all probability be inferior to the one from which the walnuts were 

 procured. That is the experience in planting seedling walnuts, as much 

 as in planting any other seedling fruits. However, there is this to 

 commend the planting of seedling walnuts, and that is, the planting of 

 seedlings with the idea of selecting some certain tree or strain which 

 may suit his particular purpose. The best tree in an orchard is largely 

 a personal ecpiation. The owner himself may have picked out a certain 

 tree which in all respects suits his tastes ; whereas if some other man 

 had owned that orchard he might pick on some other tree. Of course, 

 productiveness is not to be disputed. They would probably all pick on 

 certain trees for productiveness ; but there is that element of personal 

 equation which always enters into the selection of what is best, because 

 our idea of what is l)est is not always the same. 



Now then, briefly, all other methods of blight control have been found 

 to be a failure. The idea of spraying a walnut tree with either Bor- 

 deaux mixture or some chemical or other has been abandoned by the 

 station entirely. We tried it out pretty thoroughly when we first took 

 up the investigation of the walnut blight. We tried out a whole lot of 

 different chemicals, tried it at different times, and tried it on a scale 

 large enough which ought to show something at least as to its efficacy 

 in controlling the blight : but in no case of all the chemicals which we 

 used, applied at different times and in different places, did we find any 

 good result whatever. 



Then, again, the great size of walnut trees, the time and money 

 required to spray them, would have to procure a saving which would 

 be decidedly large in order to make it a paying proposition at all. And 

 then, besides, there is this element : After you have sprayed this year, 

 if you want a crop again the next year, you would have to do it all over 

 again. Then the idea of inoculating a tree with some kind of chemical 

 by boring holes into the trunk of the tree has been exploited largely 

 both in pear and walnut blight, principalh^ by unscrupulous persons, 

 who were after the money more than the results; and even all the 

 scientific experiments which I know of which have been made along that 

 line fail to show a single instance where this method of control of any 

 bacterial or fungous disease has been of any practical value at all. 

 They seem to fail to comprehend the situation. They do not seem to 

 understand that anything put into the trunk of the tree will not enter 

 into the circulation of a tree exactly as it will in the human system. 

 Any of the chemicals which may be introduced into the tree, no matter 

 what it may be, if it gets into the ascending sap, will be carried up into 



