ing of varieties and in a study of
their cultural requirements must be gone through before any native
species of nut-bearing trees can be planted in any of the northern
states with a certainty of commercial return from nuts alone which would
be comparable with that of many other crops which already are upon a
well established commercial basis in this part of the country.

With reference to two of the foreign species of nuts which have been
introduced, the situation is quite different. In order of commercial
importance of the nuts now grown in this country, two foreign species,
the Persian (English) walnut and the almond, stand second and third,
respectively, the pecan, which is an American species only, being first.
With these exceptions, the foreign introductions are all in the
experimental or test stage, and while possibly the European hazel
(filbert) may now be making a strong bid for commercial recognition in
the northwest, and the pistache in parts of California, neither species
can yet be recommended for commercial planting.

With the exception of a few hardshell varieties of almonds, which are
practically as hardy as the peach and which are suitable only for home
planting, as they are in no way to be compared with the almond of
commerce, there is now no indication that this species is destined ever
to be come of commercial importance east of the Rocky Mountains.

The Persian or so-called English walnut is of commercial importance in
this county only in the far Western States. In the South, it has thus
far failed altogether. In the North and East it has held out gleams of
hope, first bright, then dull, for more than a century. There is no way
of telling the number of trees of this species which have been planted
in the northeastern section of the country, but let us imagine it to
have been sixty thousand. Of these fully fifty per cent have succumbed
to climatic conditions; twenty-five per cent have been but semi-hardy,
and possibly twenty-five per cent have attained the bearing age. A part
of each of the last two classes have borne crops of commercial size for
a number of years. Some have produced nuts of good size and quality. A
great many of all those surviving are now proving susceptible to a
walnut blight upon which Mr. McMurran is to report tomorrow. A liberal
estimate of the present number of bearing Persian walnut trees in this
part of the country would be ten per cent of the original supposed sixty
thous