But history has repeated itself; the North has again invaded the South but not with drum and fife and armed hosts and has been met not with shot and shell but with a genuine southern welcome and from this commingling of northern capital and energy with southern soil and sunshine has sprung a new industry of such roseate promise as to almost make the story of Aladdin's Wonderful Lamp fade into insignificance and Dixie's imperial product, the cultivated paper shell pecan makes her bow to the world.

French explorers as early as 1740 left authentic records of pecans in the Mississippi Valley and the many giant pecan trees scattered from Maryland to Texas which the scientists tell us are hundreds of years old seem to indicate that the pecan is a native of America whose origin is lost in prehistoric times.

The earliest financial transaction in pecans that has come to my notice was in 1772 when William Prince of Flushing, New York, sold in England eight pecan trees for ten guineas each. These trees were grown from seed planted by himself.

Prior to 1890 there had been little if any attempt to plant pecans in orchards but about this time a few scattering seedling orchards began to appear.

In October 1902 about thirty owners of small pecan orchards met in Macon, Georgia, and organized the National Nut Growers Association. Of those pioneer growers only three remain today as active members of the Association, Theo. Bechtel, H. C. White, and O. P. Mears.

By this time the art of budding and grafting having become reasonably well known several pecan nurseries came into bearing and orchards of budded trees began to appear and the foundations of a real industry were laid. About this time the nursery crook began to appear and sold thousands of worthless trees but despite this handicap pecan culture continued to spread and shortly thereafter attracted the attention of Prof. John Craig of Cornell who after investigation pronounced it safe sane and profitable. He also made a study of the various sections and decided that the Albany district was the ideal section for profitable pecan culture.

This announcement by Prof. Craig was sufficient to induce northern capitalists to begin developing the Albany district on a commercial scale and several companies entered the field planting many thousand acres to be sold in units. As an evidence of the lack of faith on the part of local land owners let me say that a few weeks ago I read the original contract between one of the pioneer development companies and the gentleman from whom they bought their land. This contract was dated early in 1908 and provided for the sale on time payments of several thousand acres of land closing with the limitation that unless as much us 100 acres of this land were planted in pecans and sold in 1920 the contract was to be null and void. As a matter of fact this company developed and sold about 4500 acres in less than five years. They have long since retired as developers and give their entire time to the care of their immense orchards and the sale of their nuts which annually run around two hundred thousand pounds.

More than one of these pioneer development companies found themselves in financial difficulties due to the fact that they had sold their orchards too cheaply. Pecan growing is expensive, much more so than the average man thinks and the pecan orchards in the Albany district today that do not meet the expectations of their owners are mostly those that suffered for lack of money. Those companies with financial resources and intelligent horticulturists have developed orchards that are a source of perennial pleasure and profit to their owners.

The cultivated paper shell pecan is as superior to the wild seedling as is American gold to Mexico's money. These wild seedlings are small in size artificially colored a bright red and have a sharp, astringent taste and have a commercial value only because they are used to lower the price of mixed nuts.

When the average man hears the word "pecan" be instantly thinks of the bitter red little nut which is ever present in the supply of Christmas goodies but which is religiously culled and fed to the glowing grate. Mr. Average Man never even heard of the southern paper shell pecan. In fact, up to the present time, the demand has far exceeded the supply and but little if any effort has been made to develop new markets. I think it a conservative estimate that not ten per cent of our population have ever tasted a paper shell pecan.

The paper shell pecan is our national nut and its only competition in the markets of the world is the ignorance of the public. Acquaint the public with its merits and there will be a demand for a million times our present supply.

Away with the thought of overproduction. The "avalanch of nuts" is an old wife's fable. Do not talk to us about overproduction, when the food problem is giving the gravest concern to the master minds of the world. With population increasing and food supply diminishing the gaunt specter of famine is creeping closer and closer to the homes of men even in our own favored land.

Hunger knows no armistice. It conquers amid the snowdrifts of the North, where the grand army of Napoleon found its winding sheet. It conquers amid the burning sands of the south where the phalanx of Alexander halted in mutiny. Away with such nonsense as overproduction in discussing this the choicest food product ever given by a gracious God to a hungry world.

The ideas of yesterday do not fit the ideals of today. When conditions shift opinions must be adjusted accordingly and the pioneer growers are about to realize their golden dreams and reap their reward, for their orchards are coming into bearing and yielding tons of beautiful brown nuts for which they find a ready sale at prices ranging from 50 cents to 75 cents per pound and at even higher prices for extra fancy stock.

No doubt many extravagant statements have been made about the pecan industry but why exaggerate when the plain truth staggers the reason? Why draw on the imagination when reputable growers in the Albany District certify to returns to non-resident owners of $300 per acre in a single season.

This is one infant industry that will not cry for a protective tariff. Never will Capitol Hill resound with the eloquent plea of some statesman urging that the southern paper shell pecan industry be protected by a tariff wall.

The paper shell pecan is the horticultural triumph of the ages the gift of a gracious God who no doubt could but never did produce a finer nut and who in his inscrutable wisdom gave a natural monopoly in its culture to the lower cotton belt for no where else on the habitable globe does it reach the perfection attained there.

The Mississippi Valley has been called the cradle of the pecan industry and Georgia its nursery.

Almost all the standard varieties of pecans have come from the lower Mississippi Valley, Jackson county, Miss., perhaps leading the procession as she is the mother of no less than twelve of the standard varieties now fruiting in thousands of orchards making heavy the pockets and light the hearts of as many owners.

Southwest Georgia has monopolized the pecan nursery business. Given Albany, Georgia as a center and scribe a circle with a sixty mile radius and you have inclosed the area from which 90% of all pecan nursery stock has come. This circle includes Monticello, Florida, which probably is entitled to the honor of having grown a greater amount of pecan nursery stock than any other one community.

Texas produces the bulk of the pecan crop well informed men stating that nine-tenths of the pecans come from the Lone Star State. This may be correct but practically all Texas pecans are seedlings and while some are of real merit the bulk of the Texas crop goes to the crackeries.

The pecan belt roughly speaking is the lower cotton belt and includes in a general way the southern part of South Carolina, Georgia, north Florida, Alabama, Mississippi, Louisiana and parts of Texas and Oklahoma. The paper shell pecan grows to perfection in this limited area and nowhere else but all varieties do not thrive alike in the different sections and the growers have long since learned this and have eliminated the cumberers of the ground and replanted with those varieties adapted to that territory.

To successfully develop a pecan orchard requires money, brains and everlasting bull-dog determination for the lean years with all going out and nothing coming in try the patience and test the nerve of the stoutest man. In pecan growing even as in love-making "faint heart ne'er won fair lady."

While the kingdom of the pecan stretches from Charleston to the Rio Grande, the seat of government the capital city is Albany, Georgia, for in the charmed circle known as the Albany district is to be found a greater number of cultivated paper shell pecan trees than in all the world besides. Here it is that abundant northern capital applied to southern soil and sunshine has made the desert to blossom like the rose. Here it is that abandoned farms scarred with gullies and over grown with briar have been touched as with a magic wand and transformed into a veritable fairyland of flower gardens and fertile fields dotted with hundreds of thousands of beautiful pecan trees that lift their majestic heads towards the sky as though proud of their royal lineage. Here it is that the Mexican boll weevil before whose blighting breath our snowy fields of cotton melted over night brought no terror for King Cotton no longer reigns supreme. The king is dead but the people rejoice as the scepter falls from his nerveless hand and a new monarch ascends the throne. Millions of royal banners flutter in the breeze glistening green with promise for the future and hope is high, and the hearts of the people light as they gather to pay homage to the new monarch, Her Imperial Majesty the Paper Shell Pecan.

* * * * *

THE PRESIDENT: We now have arrived at the time when we should go ahead with some of our business work and probably the first thing we should take up is the report of the committee on nominations.

MR. OLCOTT: Your nominating committee regards it as especially fortunate that the association has a board of officers so well equipped as is the one under which the organization has just completed another year. For that reason and also because in a single year officers can scarcely put into effect plans they may have in view, the president especially being of necessity engaged largely in becoming acquainted with the field and the membership; your committee recommends the re-election of the present officers: President, Wm. S. Linton, Michigan; Vice-President, James S. McGlennon, New York; Treasurer, Willard G. Bixby, N. Y.; Secretary, Dr. W. C. Deming, Connecticut, and the executive committee as at present composed.

The Northern Nut Growers Association has reached the stage of advocating strongly the planting of nut trees of the kinds the Association has investigated. Roadside planting appears to offer an immediate field for activity and President Linton's leadership by reason of his special interest and activity in this field is particularly needed during the coming year when through the urging of this and other societies it is expected many states will follow Michigan in the matter of roadside tree planting.

We believe it would be a matter of particular satisfaction to any nominating committee of this association (as it is of this committee) to recommend continuation in office of Treasurer Bixby and Secretary Deming.

(Signed)

RALPH T. OLCOTT T. P. LITTLEPAGE ROBERT T. MORRIS C. A. REED C. P. CLOSE

MR. LITTLEPAGE: I move the adoption of the report and that the secretary be instructed to cast the entire vote of the association in support of the report of the committee.

MR. JONES: I second the motion.

The motion was carried.

THE PRESIDENT: Ladies and gentlemen. When I started for Washington it was with the determination that another should succeed me as president of the association the one reason being that my time had been so occupied during the past year that it seemed impossible for me to go ahead with the work as it should be done as president of this organization. Now I am going to accept the election which you have so kindly conferred and I am doing it for two reasons. I like the association and the membership of this organization. I feel for the other reason that my work has not been completed and I desire to finish it. Now then you should have your membership doubled. Every last member of the organization should put forth efforts this year towards that end. Here is one plan that I have under way. I asked the faculty of our agricultural college at Lansing if they would undertake to supply me with the names of those who have nut trees in Michigan not the ordinary kind but those producing good nuts and in plenty. I have the names of from fifty to one hundred of those men owning perhaps a thousand good nut trees. I do not believe that there is one of those men but would become a member of this association if the matter were properly presented to him. We have in Michigan 1,500 townships or more. Now we have a way of reaching the supervisors of those townships through some of our departments and we can practically take a census of the nut bearing trees in Michigan so that instead of having from fifty to one hundred names here we should have several hundred. Really 75 per cent of those men should be members of this association. Now what we hope to do this year in Michigan I feel can be done in every other state that is interested in our particular work. I want to ask your co-operation you who live in other states to assist in doing it. Then when we meet a year hence I hope it may be somewhere in the central West. You honored our state last year with the annual meeting. Of course we would like to have you there again. You are welcome. We would be glad to receive you but Michigan has been thus honored and I imagine that it would add to our force in other sections to hold the meeting elsewhere, in Illinois or Iowa or perhaps even a little further west. Some associations are now meeting in Yellowstone Park and if we should go there we would have the states of Idaho, Montana, Utah and Wyoming. We should get membership in all of those states. The place of the next meeting I think is very important. Now I think I have plainly stated my position in the matter and I am going to try to serve you another year. I hope that at the end of that year we will have our membership at least doubled. Let us try and treble it. I thank you. (Applause).

The next subject under discussion then will be the place of meeting.

THE SECRETARY: The by-laws say that the place for the next meeting shall be selected by the convention assembled or in the event of failure in that by the executive committee. Sometimes we have done it one way and sometimes the other. The proper thing to do I think is for the advocates of the different localities to now present their attractions.

MR. POMEROY: Our vice-president when he left asked me to suggest Rochester, N. Y. While at Rochester Niagara county is only a short automobile or trolley ride away. In Niagara county are quite a good many walnut trees in bearing.

MR. RUSH: Mr. President, I invite this association to convene next year in Lancaster City, Lancaster County, Pennsylvania. We can show you a very prosperous nut nursery and some young bearing walnut trees and Harrisburg and other places of interest. I am satisfied that you can not meet at a more convenient place than Lancaster City. Therefore I extend the association a hearty invitation.

THE SECRETARY: I would like to hear from Mr. Reed as to the attractions of the eastern shore of Maryland.

MR. REED: There are several places, Mr. President, where I wish you might go next year. One of those places is the eastern shore of Maryland. As I told you last year I regard the eastern shore of Maryland as one of the promising places of the whole East for the development of nut orcharding and I find there a great deal of latent interest and a great deal to see. I am a little disappointed that we have not some representatives here at this meeting from the eastern shore. I am sure that if we should decide to go there we would be received with enthusiasm and we would be shown something that would be quite a surprise to most of us.

Then another place that I would like to have considered for some meeting in the near future is the middle West. The Professor of Horticulture in Missouri is a warm personal friend of mine a classmate of mine in college, and he is very enthusiastic about the possibilities of nut culture in that state. He is waiting to be told or shown how to go ahead, and if we were to go out there I am sure he would follow the lead if we set the pace. He would take hold and push the nut industry in that section. In that same neighborhood is the orchard that Mr. Bixby told us about the chestnut orchard of Mr. Riehl of one or two thousand chestnut trees planted on hillsides that have never been plowed and which are giving Mr. Riehl a very lucrative income. Mr. Riehl is 83 years old and is not going to live always. We certainly ought to see that place while he is there. We have no invitation out there and none from the eastern shore and I am always in favor of going where we have an invitation. It would be my feeling in view of the present situation that we accept one of the invitations that have already been given to us.

MR. RUSH: We met once in Lancaster about eight years ago but at that time we had little to show. We had no nut nursery of any consequence at all and no bearing walnut trees at that time. Now we have them in their prime.

DR. MORRIS: I would like very much to go to both places, the ones described by Mr. Pomeroy and by Mr. Rush.

MR. JONES: I would like to say that we were at Rochester three years after Lancaster and I think Lancaster is entitled to it if you take time into consideration. I think Lancaster is entitled to the meeting now.

MR. LITTLEPAGE: I move that we accept the invitation of Mr. Rush and Mr. Jones to meet in Lancaster, Pennsylvania next year. I am going to couple with that another motion which you can consider if you desire and that is that we fix the time of meeting. I think that rather important. I think there are many reasons for it. These meetings are attended by many people who must know as far in advance as possible. Quite a good many people take touring trips over the United States and if they know when these meetings are going to be held they would be very glad to time themselves to be at that point at that particular time. For example a few years ago when we had a meeting here Mr. Groner toured here from Oregon and timed his trip to be here. Later he timed his trip to be at the national meeting at Mobile, Alabama. It is very important because we all take vacations and we have to make our vacation arrangements in advance. It seems to me that the time would be fixed now instead of letting it lie over and finally select the wrong time. I therefore move that we accept the invitation of the gentlemen from Lancaster and then that we fix the time.

PROF. CLOSE: I second the motion.

The motion was unanimously carried.

MR. REED: Mr. President, I would like to make a suggestion in regard to the date. There are two purposes that we have in mind. One to see things growing and another to see the product. We can hardly do both the same year. This year we have seen things growing. We have had almost a summer meeting and it seems to me that unless the local folks who have invited us to Lancaster should disagree we might well afford to have our next meeting a December meeting. Then we can see nuts. We can discuss nuts themselves. I would make that motion that our meeting be the second week in December the Wednesday and Thursday of the second week in December, 1921.

THE TREASURER: Would not the prime object in going to Lancaster be to see things grow? Wouldn't it be difficult if not impossible to really accomplish that by a December meeting?

MR. LITTLEPAGE: I think a winter meeting might just us well be held in New York or Baltimore or Washington. I do not agree with Mr. Reed. If I go to Lancaster I would go to see things. I went up there one December and nearly froze.

DR. MORRIS: We could split the difference between the two. I think Mr. Jones and Mr. Rush should be consulted in the matter.

MR. RUSH: I think it would be important to have it the same week as the York Fair as they have the reputation of never having any rain and this is a very good time of the year to have an exhibition. You see the fine crops and everything which is agricultural and horticultural. And another thing in connection with this we can see the hazels on the bushes at this time of the year.

DR. MORRIS: I move that we meet about this time next year.

MR. RUSH: I think this week in 1921.

MR. LITTLEPAGE: In order to get the matter before the meeting I move that the convention next year meet at Lancaster, Pennsylvania on the Thursday and Friday of the first week in October.

MR. JONES: I second the motion.

The motion was unanimously carried.

PRESIDENT LINTON: Before closing I want to call to your recognition a kindly act that I know will please you all. Yesterday while we were having our pictured taken I lost this package of papers. Today it has been returned to me by two boy scouts. From what I know of that organization I do not believe that there is anything doing the boy any more good than their training. I am interested in a forty-acre piece of land on Lawton Lake, Michigan, on which this year we permitted the boy scouts to camp. I followed their training somewhat to ascertain what it was. I was in camp with them two or three days and learned that it is a training that is doing the boys of the country a lot of good. Their motto as I understand it is to do good or to be of service to others. These two lads that brought this package to me refused to receive any compensation whatever. They are the two who have tramped from New York City to San Francisco and are now on their way back. If these boys or their organization ever get interested in our movement in the planting of nuts throughout the country we will be glad to help them.

PROF. CLOSE: There is one committee whose report has not been called for and for the sake of the record I presume it might better be offered. That is the auditing committee. The committee was composed of Messrs. Reed and Close and we desire to say that the report of the treasurer has been scrutinized very carefully and we are not able to detect any mistakes. The balance in the treasury is $75.26; total receipts including the amount on hand at the beginning of the year $666.48; total expenditures $591.22, leaving a balance in the treasury of $75.26.

THE TREASURER: I want to offer a resolution that Article III of the by-laws on Membership which now reads, "All annual memberships shall begin with the first day of the calendar quarter following the date of the association" be amended to read, "That all annual memberships shall begin with the first day of such calendar month as shall be agreed upon."

Now I will tell you why I ask that. Most of the memberships are combined with the subscription to the American Nut Journal. In many instances the new members have requested that their subscription to the journal be dated back one or two months for the sake of getting one or twp numbers of the journal. In some instances they are already subscribers to the journal and they want to change it to make it come the same time. I offer that amendment to the by-laws.

MR. REED: I move that the change be made.

DR. MORRIS: I second the motion.

The motion was carried.

THE TREASURER: Here is another thing I think is a matter of a good deal of importance. There has been spoken of two or three times during the day the great progress which is likely to be made in systematic hybridization of nuts. It has come to my knowledge recently that the Arnold Arboretum is seeking to establish a regular plant breeding department. They have growing on their grounds the greatest collection of trees and shrubs that will grow in that section that can be found anywhere in the country. I want to offer a resolution as follows:

WHEREAS it is the firm belief of the Association that one of the most hopeful sources of obtaining nuts better than we now have is by carefully planned and executed work of hybridization, and

WHEREAS such work, particularly in the case of the slower developing nuts, such for example as the hickories, will require the uninterrupted carrying out of carefully planned work for a long series of years, and

WHEREAS the Arnold Arboretum, of Jamaica Plain, Mass., has on its grounds a greater collection of the trees and shrubs from all parts of the world that will grow in that location than can be found anywhere else in the country, including a large number of hickories of various species in bearing, and

WHEREAS the Arnold Arboretum is now assembling on its grounds the various propagated nut trees, and has expressed its intention of continuing this work and of including all varieties that it may be able to obtain of those hickory trees notable for any one quality and which may promise to be valuable for hybridizing purposes, and

WHEREAS the Arnold Arboretum is desirous of establishing a regular plant breeding department where nut trees, particularly hickories, as well as trees valuable for timber purposes, flowers, etc., may be bred, and, in order to provide for the uninterrupted carrying out of this work is seeking to raise an endowment, be it hereby

RESOLVED: That the Northern Nut Growers Association assembled in the City of Washington, D. C., this 8th day of October in the year 1920 heartily endorses this purpose of the Arnold Arboretum as one likely to promote the acquisition of finer nuts than we now have, and urges all persons able to do so to aid in any way possible.

DR. MORRIS: I move that we adopt that resolution.

MR. REED: I second the motion.

The motion was carried unanimously.

THE PRESIDENT: If there is nothing before the body at this time I will declare the eleventh annual session closed.



APPENDIX

From C. K. Sober, Lewisburg, Pa.:

My bearing chestnut trees, most of them, have gone out but in the 40 acres of chestnut nursery stock I find there are thousands of trees that seem to be immune from the blight up to this time. While they stand right beside trees in the nursery that have died from blight yet there is not a spot on them.

From W. O. Potter, Marion, Illinois:

I am putting forth every effort to develop a nut orchard here in southern Illinois the like of which will not be excelled in this state. My pecans are doing nicely. I have five acres already set to budded trees and fifteen acres planted to seedlings which I hope to bud next year. I have budded chestnuts, black walnuts and almost all varieties of nuts that will grow here in the North. I am using filberts for fillers among my pecans.

I have just harvested my first crop of filberts from my experimental garden here in town and my bushes at Halcyon Frunut Gardens (this is the name of my nut farm) are growing nicely and some have catkins for next year's crop. The filberts that I have just harvested were borne from three Cosford bushes of the French strain. I have some German strain that I received from Mr. McGlennon that are full of catkins for next year.

I had some pecans to bloom last spring, but they failed to set any nuts. I have about a peck from two budded Thomas black walnut trees that are four and five years old. I have one Stabler that has two nuts on it now only three years from transplant. My Rush seedling chinquapin that bore last year has only about six nuts on it this year but they have not yet matured.

I hope some day to have a nut orchard that will be the show place of southern Illinois and then I will invite the association to have an annual meeting here and at my farm.

From G. H. Corsan, Toronto, Canada:

This time I can say that my trees never looked so well. All passed through last winter and the terrible winter of three years ago. My list consists of the following: Constantinople hazelnuts, Kent filberts, Manchurian juglans regia, Jap heart nuts, Pomeroy juglans regia, Canadian seed juglans regia, common native chestnuts, Col. Sober's paragon chestnuts, castanea crenata.

The chestnuts grow a foot more from all terminal branches, not a twig winter-killed. Constantinople hazelnuts grew two feet from all terminal branches and not a bud winter-killed. Kent filberts killed back some branches, others did not, grew well this summer from 1-1/2 feet to a yard.

There is a huge crop of Pomeroy paragon chestnuts on my trees this year. No blight near me, as thank heaven the farmers around me are too stupid to plant chestnut trees and in fact no farmer ever planted a nut tree with two exceptions within 20 miles of me. But one farmer by name of Anderson planted a mile of black walnuts along the roadside 75 years ago. These trees are loaded with nuts and boys just now and they reach away up higher than the tallest phone wire (that is the lowest branches do).

All juglans regias grew a yard from each terminal bud. My Pomeroys after killing back for several years have at last got a real good start and are going to live and bear. When I see a bluish tinge to the leaf of juglans regia, together with a smooth glossy leaf, not too long—having 7 and not 17 leaves to the stalk—and having a very white grey bark, then I know that the nut will be EXTRA good, and though that type of tree is a bit tender and requires water in the early and mid-dry summer, as well as hard wood ashes, lime and chicken manure in the late fall, this is the tree that on the north aide of Lake Ontario where I am now some day will bear and ripen real nuts.

My grapes and peaches ripen well this fall, though we as all others had a late spring and my Indiana and Iowa pecans actually grew 2 feet from terminal buds.

Were I an old man of 80 I would plant nut trees to the exclusion of every other work. First, I would be growing a crop of food 150 years after my death. Second, I believe that every man who has vitality to live over 80 has been a bad man in his youth and he owes it to the world. Third, it is a healthy occupation, stooping down and digging and takes the rust and poisons out of the system. Fourth, there is a joy seeing the leaves and branches grow the next summer and in old age one must feed and take joy from the eye and ear more and more and less and less from the mouth and stomach. Fifth, it is not at all an unreasonable supposition that as a boy again I may be climbing the same trees that I planted. And if I know for certain that I would not be then some other boy will take my place.

The salvation of the future is more and more food from trees and less and less from animal sources. The day is fast passing when the farm consists of a tobacco barn, a pig pen, a cow stable and a hennery. From living upon a badly selected type of food we fear the flu and other diseases. No disease will ever come out of a nut tree. But we are a lot of fools and blame the absolutely innocent cucumber for what a vile mixture of salt and vinegar does to us and thus these same asses will say, "that nuts are unhealthy" and we pay a billion dollars out every three months to have the dentists fix our teeth that never receive any nut grinding exercise!

From J. F. Jones, Lancaster, Pa.:

I expect as you do that there will be no need of much room for the convention. The fact is that without any commercial nut planting in the territory covered by the Northern Nut Growers Association it is remarkable that there has been as much interest as there is. I happen to know that the southern pecan (National) Association was kept going by the nurseries down there for a good many years, or largely by them, and without the commercial planting of the pecan there I do not think the Association would have kept going very long even if it had been founded.

I believe eventually there will be some interest in commercial planting north but it will go pretty slow and be after our time I judge. In commercial planting I mean plantings of not less than ten acres. I occasionally sell orders of 50 and even 100 trees, but they are usually scattered as to kinds and varieties of nuts and evidently designed to test out on a fair scale the merits of the different nuts. A man was here a few days ago and gave me an order for nearly a hundred black walnut trees. He has been planting for several years, starting with a half dozen trees three or four years ago and reports the trees doing fine. I presume you could call his planting this year a small commercial planting as that is what he has in mind.

The boom in planting fruit trees has taken some interest away from nut planting and this will continue as long as fruit is selling well.

From T. C. Tucker, Sail Francisco, Ca.:

Your program for the approaching meeting of the Northern Nut Growers Association, which has just reached me, is a most interesting one. It is with regret that I find I shall not be able to be with you. This is shipping season for the California Almond Industry and my presence here at this time is imperative.

While through the California Almond Growers Exchange I have for some time been a member of the Northern Nut Growers Association, I have not as yet had the pleasure of meeting with you, but I want to extend you a cordial invitation to visit California and I hope that at some future date a convention of the Northern Nut Growers Association will be held in this state. Here, as nut growers, you will find much of interest. This is the only state in the Union producing almonds commercially. Our 1919 crop was worth approximately $4,000,000.00 and represented 7000 tons of nuts. Here in this state we also produce the California Walnuts which in 1919 brought a return of approximately $20,000,000.00. Both of these industries are in their infancy, particularly is this true of the almond. It is estimated that there are 100,000 acres in California planted to almonds, the major portion of which is non-bearing.

We are now preparing for the future through an energetic sales campaign and by making plans for manufacturing by using almonds in new and attractive preparations. In 1919, the California Almond Growers Exchange, a non-profit association of 3800 farmers, spent approximately $208,000.00 for National Advertising and the expenditure in 1910 will exceed a quarter of a million dollars. This is done not only to sell the crops of 1919 and 1920 advantageously, but to educate the consumer up to the high food value of the almond and incidentally to lay a substantial foundation for future business.

We believe that the outlook for the California Almond is promising, but it is only as promising as the growers co-operate to that end. We believe that by a strong association of growers, quality and grades can be improved, distribution widened and the public made acquainted with the value of our product through the medium of our advertising.

We are also taking up at this time the cultural question endeavoring to eliminate the undesirable varieties and improve those which are commercially profitable.

We have some eighty odd varieties of almonds in this state, many of which are not known commercially. You will thus see that we have quite a problem in cultural lines.

The principal object of the Northern Nut Growers Association, I believe, is the diffusion of knowledge on cultural questions, but a word of co-operative marketing may not be amiss.

Our investigations have shown that for twenty-five years before the war Nonpareil Almonds (our highest priced variety) retailed at about 30c per pound. The grower received from 7c to 10c per pound, the average being close to 8c. This was before the association was formed. After the association was organized, the grower received, through co-operative marketing and by the elimination of speculation and waste in distribution, a range of from 14c to 20c for Nonpareils with an average of approximately 16c while the price to the consumer remained about 35c. During the past two years, the price to the consumer has of course advanced to meet the increase in cost of transportation, cost of doing business and of production. As a matter of fact, the increase in price to the consumer has not kept pace with the big increase in the cost of production. The point I wish to make, however, is that co-operative marketing has on the average, by the elimination of speculation and, as before said, by minimizing waste in distribution, secured for the almond grower a living price.

We do not believe that the marketing problems of the farmer will ever be satisfactorily solved until he takes them up through co-operative methods and solves them himself.

My work for the past eleven years has been in connection with the sale of almonds and I am happy to say that while our country is going through a period of trying re-adjustment at the present time, the association has meant to the almond growers of California a wonderful insurance against loss. The consumer, too, has been benefited as this association has been able to lay down almonds in the markets of the United States at a lower distribution cost than would otherwise have been possible.

However, assuming that this convention is interested mostly in cultural questions, I shall refrain from further discussing the marketing problem. Let us not however, lose sight of the fact that it matters not what may be the quality of our product if we cannot dispose of it at a profit.

A satisfactory margin of profit means improved varieties, better culture, increased yields and better satisfied producers. Scientific yields and better satisfied producers. Scientific cultural effort, to achieve its highest possibilities must inevitably be linked with commercial success.



ATTENDANCE

Dr. J. E. Cannaday, Charleston, W. Va. Conrad Vollertsen, Rochester, N. Y. J. P. Beck, Saginaw, Michigan Prof. C. P. Close, Maryland B. C. Foster, Washington, D. C. J. W. Ritchit, Yonkers, N. Y. Dr. G. J. Buist, Brooklyn, N. Y. T. P. Littlepage, Washington, D. C. C. A. Reed, Washington, D. C. Mrs. C. A. Reed William S. Linton, Saginaw, Michigan W. C. Bixby, Baldwin, N. Y. Mrs. Bixby A. S. Perry, Cuthbert, Ga. Dr. W. C. Deming, Wilton, Conn. R. T. Olcott, Rochester, N. Y. W. R. Fickes, Wooster, Ohio A. C. Pomeroy, Lockport, N. Y. Elam G. Hess, Mannheim, Pa. F. E. Brooks, French Creek, W. Va. W. N. Roper, Petersburg, Va. Mrs. Roper Dr. R. T. Morris, New York City. Dr. J. H. Kellogg, Battle Creek, Michigan J. F. Jones, Lancaster, Pa. Miss Jones Dr. J. B. Curtis, Orange Heights, Fla. Mrs. Curtis Dr. John F. Keenen, Brentwood, Maryland. J. S. McGlennon, Rochester, N. Y. H. C. Best, Bridgeport, Conn. J. E. Brown, Elmer, N. J. E. E. Reynolds, Washington, D. C. J. G. Rush, West Willow, Pa. D. F. Clark, Harrisburg, Pa. Theodore Bechtel, Ocean Springs, Miss. Mrs. Bechtel Miss W. M. Daish, Washington, D. C.



EXHIBITS

Morris hybrid chinquapin No. 1—From graft set spring 1910 on bush chinquapin stock. A scientific cross or hybrid made by Dr. Robert T. Morris New York City. Very resistant to blight is not blight proof. Has the fruiting habit of the chestnut and bears on very small bushes or trees. Grown by J. P. Jones, Lancaster, Pa.

Morris hybrid chinquapin No. 2—From grafts set on stocks of the bush chinquapin spring 1919. Similar to No. 1.

Chinese pine nuts, Pinus armandi, from the mountains of North China. The Chinese pine nuts, P. armandi and P. bungeana, although not equal to some of our own pine nuts from the southeastern states, are considered the best and most reliable for eastern and northern planting in this country. Sent in by J. F. Jones, Lancaster, Pa.

Bush chinquapin Castanea pumila, grown by J. F. Jones. Branches of ordinary wild nuts.

24 plates hazels or filberts grown by Carl Vollertsen, Rochester, N. Y.

Nine varieties J. regia, peanuts, hazels and Weicker shellbarks, grown by J. G. Rush, West Willow, Pa.

23 plates and varieties of the southern pecan, sent by A. S. Perry, Cuthbert, Ga. Also collection of photographs.

Specimens of the Beam, Beaver, Clark, Manahan, Stanley, Swaim and Weicker hickories by W. G. Bixby, New York.

Miscellaneous nuts by W. C. Deming, Wilton, Conn.

Large table map of the United States with the different nuts grown therein so placed as to show their native habitats. By C. A. Reed, Nut Culturist, Dept, of Agriculture.

Specimens of Corylus avellana, Montebello Bysance and other nuts by Dr. David Fairchild, Washington, D. C.

By Prof. C. P. Close, College Park, Md., plates of seedling J. regia from J. W. Smith, Centerville, Md. Five seedling J. regia probably Mayette from S. H. Derby, Woodside, Del. Japanese seedling chestnut from J. W. Killen, Felton, Del. The tree on which they grew has never blighted. J. Sieboldiana from tree set by Prof. Close in 1910, first crop 1920.

Native chinquapins and two varieties of Dr. Van Fleet's hybrid chinquapins. Major pecans borne in 1919 on three year graft set by Prof. Close at College Park. A hazel seedling from New Jersey grown on four year old graft. Large and good.

By Dr. R. T. Morris of New York, plate of pistache nuts, 6 varieties of hazels, 1 of black walnuts and one of butternuts.

Nut cracker for pecans of different sizes.

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PECANS. ENGLISH WALNUTS AND CHESTNUT TREES

All varieties of budded or grafted, hardy nut trees for planting in northern localities. In the southern United states, on the Pacific Coast and in Europe orchards of nut trees give the land a greater value than when used for any other crop. Nut trees in many sections are the moat profitable crop that can be raised. Plant now, before everyone is doing it and reap the success the pioneer nut planters in other sections have done.

Largest hardy nut nurseries in America. Send for catalog.

McCOY NUT NURSERIES 741 Old State Bank Bldg., EVANSVILLE, Indiana

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BUDDED AND GRAFTED CHESTNUTS of best varieties.

No Blight. Also THOMAS WALNUT

E. A. RIEHL, GODFREY, ILL.

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ARROWFIELD NURSERIES

PETERSBURG, VIRGINIA

Pecan trees of the hardy northern varieties. Unquestionably will flourish and bear over a much larger area of the United States than where they are now native in Indiana, Illinois, Ohio, Iowa and other states. Send for price list.

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