t be made to
advantage.

As it is believed that hickory nuts will be sold in the shell, as are
pecans, it was not possible to do this to the same extent as with black
walnuts. However, the characteristic "form," which is difficult if not
almost impossible to estimate with any kind of precision, it was thought
for the present at least might be disregarded. Husking quality is
important but it was impossible to properly award points for this
characteristic in a nut contest, because the nuts are husked before
being sent in. The points allowed for excellence in these qualities were
added to others, which gave 10 points to Cracking Quality Absolute
instead of 5, and 25 points to Quality and Flavor of Kernel instead of
20.

It has been generally considered that a nut which is awarded 55 points,
even though it took no prize, was worthy of experimental propagation.
There were 40 hickories in the 1929 contest which were awarded 55 points
or more. Of those actually awarded prizes for a combination of good
qualities, twenty-one in number, thirteen were thought to be shagbarks,
or it might be more exact to state that we had not sufficient evidence
to think them to be otherwise, although some are suspected not to be
pure Carya ovata, four were thought to be Carya Dunbarii (Carya ovata x
laciniosa), two were thought to be Carya ovalis, and two Carya
laciniosa. In this contest the shagbarks showed up poorly, 68 being the
highest score awarded, when from the number of entries one would have
expected the highest to have been awarded 71 points or over. On the
other hand this is the first contest where a prize has been awarded to a
shellbark, Carya laciniosa. Among hickories awarded 54 points or over
were five shellbarks, two of them large ones, one weighing 24.3g, 20 per
lb. and one weighing 27.6g, 17 per lb.

The importance of this will be realized when we consider that, in the
1929 contest, out of 21 prize winning nuts four prizes were awarded to
nuts believed to be Carya Dunbarii (Carya ovata x laciniosa) and there
were two or three others that may prove to be. While natural hickory
hybrids are not particularly rare yet they are far from common. At one
time, while on the levees north of Burlington, Iowa, the number of pecan
x shellbark hybrids seen impressed the writer, yet a careful count
showed these hybrids to be only about 1 hybrid in 100 pure pecans.
Considerable experience in making or attempting to make hickory hybrids
leads