8 
J. F. JONES, LANCASTER, PA. 
Gathering English Walnuts from a two-year 
tree in my test orchard. 
Age of Bearing 
One of the big advantages of 
budded or grafted nut trees is early 
bearing.. We often have the im¬ 
proved English walnut trees to 
bear nuts the third year and some¬ 
times the second, and they may be 
counted upon to bear by the fifth 
year here. The black walnut is no 
exception, and bears nearly, if not 
quite, as early as the English on 
the average. The heart nut bears 
even younger and it is not unusual 
for the Lancaster to bear a few 
nuts the second year after grafting. 
A top-worked pecan tree in Mr. J. 
G. Rush’s grounds, West Willow, 
Pa., which we grafted for him 
spring 1917, bore a few nuts in the 
season of 1919. 
Mr. J. F. Wilkinson, a pioneer 
pecan grower in Indiana, says: “All 
of my four year budded and grafted 
pecan trees bore from 20 to 97 nuts 
each last fall, and most of them 
bore a few nuts in 1918, at three 
years old. Three trees bore a few 
clusters of nuts each in 1917, at two 
years old.” 
Are Grafted Nut Trees Appreciated? 
While those experienced in fruit growing realize at once the big advantages 
of grafted nut trees of fine varieties over seedlings, most people do not evident¬ 
ly appreciate what we arc giving them, as is evidenced by their buying seedling 
trees from others at prices nearly as high in many cases as those we are charg¬ 
ing for budded or grafted trees of the finest varieties. The cost of growing 
these seedling trees is only about one-tenth that of grafted trees and requires 
no skill to produce. In fact, we dig and burn about twenty thousand seedlings 
a year on which buds or grafts have failed to take and have not offered them 
for sale at any price. One of the seedling English walnut growers told me in 
conversation two years ago that he did not sell any trees under $5.00 each and 
that lie could easily sell all he had at that price! Another concern that ad¬ 
vertises extensively boasts of an out-put of thirty thousand English walnut 
trees and their prices have run about two-thirds that of good grafted trees. 
While some of these people catalogue named varieties and otherwise try to lead 
the purchaser to think he is getting improved varieties, there is really no ex¬ 
cuse for any one being fooled in thinking they are getting any thing but seed¬ 
ling trees, since these seedling fellows do not say they are selling budded or 
grafted trees and would not dare do so, because to do so would be clear evi¬ 
dence of intent to defraud and they would be shut out of the U. S. Mails. In 
view of these facts, I would warn those wanting nut trees for fruiting to be 
sure they arc getting budded or grafted trees of approved varieties, regardless 
of whom they arc purchased. 
