shagbark and the shellbark, mocker-nut and pignut. These trees will
not be expected to bear nuts, because in the struggle for food and light
their energies will be directed toward making trunks.
Hickories are undoubtedly to be used for decorative purposes in parks
and streets by future generations. The stately pecan, the sturdy
shagbark, can be made to replace, South and North, the millions of
useless poplars, willows, and other bunches of leaves, which please the
eye but render no valuable annual or final returns. The chief reason why
this has not been done is because people have not thought about it.
* * * * *
President Morris: This paper is not to be considered with the respect
that is ordinarily due to a presidential address, but is open for
discussion, and I would like to have any of my theories disproven.
Professor Craig: Doctor Morris has covered a very extensive field in his
presidential address, and has raised so many interesting questions that
I imagine the difficulty with you is to know just where to begin.
Personally, and because I am not as thoroughly aware of the field of
Doctor Morris' hybridization work as I ought to be, I should like to ask
him what combinations of the hickories he has effected thus far. The
field of hybridizing nuts is an exceedingly interesting one, and Doctor
Morris has been the foremost worker in it. I am sure it would be
interesting to you, as it is to myself, to know briefly what ground he
has covered in the extensive range of his experiments.
President Morris: In answering that question, I am speaking from memory
and may not speak correctly. I have made crosses back and forth between
shagbark, bitternut, mocker-nut, pignut, and pecan. In the crosses I
made, using pecans, pollen was received from the South and put upon the
others. The number of crosses that are fertile I cannot state as yet,
because I have not had experience enough in protecting these nuts, and
many of the hybrid nuts were lost. Squirrels and mice destroyed the
labor of three of my men and myself during one season. I have secured
fertile hybrids between the pecan and the bitternut and between the
pecan and the shagbark. If I remember correctly, those are the only
fertile hybrids I have between hickories at the present time. In regard
to crossing hickories and walnuts, I have crossed back and forth several
of the walnuts, our black walnut, our butternut, the Siebold walnut,
w
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