380 
AMERICAN AGRICULTURIST. 
[October, 
[COPYRIGHT SECURED.] 
■Drawn by Granville Perkins .—Engraved for the American Agriculturist. 
price. Two great points in favor of the chest¬ 
nut are the rapidity of its growth, and the readi¬ 
ness with which it renews itself after being cut 
down. It grows freely in any soils that are not 
too wet, and is hardy over a wide extent of 
country, it being found native from the 43d par¬ 
allel to as far south as Florida. The chestnut 
presents many claims to those who are interest¬ 
ed in tree planting, not only as valuable for the 
treeless portions of the West, but for those 
lands of the East which can only be made re¬ 
munerative by covering them with forests: the 
great obstacle to its introduction has been the 
difficulty of procuring the seed or the plants. 
The seeds are not usually kept by seedsmen, as 
they soon become worthless, and unless one has 
friends in a locality where chestnuts grow, they 
are not easy to obtain. As to the matter of 
plants, wc notice that Messrs. Storrs, Harrison 
& Co., of Painesville, 0., make a specialty of 
them, and offer them at moderate prices. Those 
who wish to grow the trees from the seed, 
should make arrangements to procure the nuts 
as soon as ripe, and they may be sown as soon 
as received. A wide drill is opened and the 
nuts scattered rather thickly, the spaces between 
them are to be filled by sprinkling soil among 
them, and then covering with two or three 
inches of leaves. In the spring the greater por¬ 
tion of the leaves is to be raked off, and when 
the young plants have grown an inch or two, 
fine soil is drawn up to them. Squirrels, go¬ 
phers, and mice, will destroy the nuts if they 
discover them, and in localities where these 
pests abound, the seeds must be kept until 
spring. They should be mixed with .three times 
their bulk of dry sand. They are said to retain 
their vitality if packed in perfectly dry moss. 
The chestnut can be readily transplanted if re¬ 
moved while young, and nursery trees that have 
been transplanted twice, the tap-root being re¬ 
moved, are quite as likely to live as most other 
deciduous trees. Our native chestnut is a varie¬ 
ty of the European, differing in the size of its 
fruit. The fruit of ours is much smaller, but at 
the same time superior in sweetness and flavor. 
There is a great difference in the product of our 
wild trees, some of them yielding fruit twice the 
size of the average. There is no doubt that by 
selection and cultivation, the size of the nuts of 
the American variety could be greatly improved. 
