Ohio Farmer." Through its pages our contests get a wide
publicity. Mr. Ray Kelsey has furnished us with 5000 folders announcing
the contest and the purpose behind it. We have the cooperation of the
Experiment Station here at Wooster and its affiliated agencies. Drs.
Secrist and Gourley have been kind, encouraging, helpful. Dr. Oliver
Diller, of the Forestry Department, and Mr. Walter Sherman, of the
Mahoning Farm, have helped and worked with us in a hundred ways. We feel
the NNGA ought to know about this harmonious and whole-hearted team
work.

Nut Growing Under Semi-Arid Conditions

A. G. Hirschi, Oklahoma City, Oklahoma

The pecan is the major nut crop in Oklahoma. The timber growth along the
rivers and creeks contains enough pecan trees, if they were properly
distributed, to make one continuous pecan grove entirely across the
state.

Pecan improvement work is only in its beginning. The Oklahoma Pecan
Grower's Association was organized in 1926. It is devoted to the general
improvement of the pecan, and to the dissemination of information gained
by the members from their experience and observation. Dr. Frank Cross,
head of the Department of Horticulture of our A & M College at
Stillwater, is very active in nut improvement and is giving us much
valuable assistance. Early in the history of our association we began to
graft the large improved varieties on our seedling trees. True, many
mistakes were made. I recall when all our trees producing small and
inferior nuts, were cut down level with the ground, and the sprouts
growing from the roots, were budded or grafted to paper-shells. This
meant a long wait for production. We soon realized it was better to stub
back the limbs and graft these, or permit the sprouts to develop and bud
them, plus saving most of the framework of the trees, which gives us
heavy production of grafted pecans in a short time.

Competing growth, that is underbrush and all kinds of trees other than
pecans, rob the grove of moisture, sunlight, and plant food. This growth
was formerly removed by hand grubbing, but now with a large bulldozer it
is pushed right out of the ground into piles where it is burned. Now the
ground is clean, no stumps to grub out, and ready for a cover-crop or
clean cultivation. Nothing remains but pecan trees, some elm, hackberry
and oak, too large for the bulldozer. These are poisoned and burned
right where they stand the following winter. For poisoning a mixture o