English Walnuts | Page 5

a most peculiar and interesting way.
The late Norman Pomeroy of Lockport, New York, made the discovery
quite by accident. When he was in Philadelphia in 1876 visiting the
Centennial Exposition, he awoke one morning to be greeted by the
leaves of a gorgeous tree, which just touched his window and through

which the sun shone brightly. He soon was examining a magnificent
English Walnut tree. On the ground directly under he found the nuts,
which had fallen during the night. Their flavor was more delicious and
the meat fuller than any he had ever before tasted. The shell was
unusually thin and Mr. Pomeroy was astonished, for he never believed
the English Walnut grew in the East.
Knowing the varieties grown in California could not be raised in the
East or North, he questioned his landlord and found that this particular
tree had been brought from Northern Europe. Mr. Pomeroy determined
at once that possibly this variety would be hardy enough for cultivation
in New York State. He procured some of the nuts and put them in his
satchel which he entrusted to a neighbor who was about to start home.
The neighbor reached home all right and so did the nuts--but--the
neighbor's children found the rare delicacies and ate all but seven. They
would doubtless have eaten these too but fortunately they had slipped
into the lining of the satchel where Mr. Pomeroy found them on his
return to Lockport. These seven nuts, which had so narrow an escape
from oblivion, are now seven beautiful English Walnut trees, sixty or
more feet high and the progenitors of the Pomeroy orchards, all of
which are now producing nuts like the originals--a very fine quality.
[Sidenote: =Some uses of English Walnuts=]
English Walnuts to be used for making pickles, catsup, oil and other
culinary products, are gathered when the fruit is about half mature or
when the shell is soft enough to yield to the influence of cooking. The
proper stage can be determined by piercing the nut with a needle, a
certain degree of hardness being desired. The nut is often utilized for
olive oil in some parts of Europe. It takes one hundred pounds of nuts
to make eighteen pounds of oil.
In England the nuts are preserved fresh for the table where they are
served with wine. They are buried deep in dry soil or sand so as not to
be reached by frost, the sun's rays or rain; or by placing them in dry
cellars and covering with straw. Others seal them up in tin cans filled
with sand.

[Sidenote: =Examples of Hardiness=]
As an illustration of the hardiness of the English Walnut, there is a tree
at Red Hill, Virginia, which was brought from Edinburgh, Scotland,
when six months old, planted in New York, where it remained three
years, then removed to Staunton, Virginia, and after two years taken to
Red Hill. In consequence of so many changes, the tree at first died back,
but is now thrifty--twenty feet high; trunk, eight inches in diameter at
the ground.
During several severe Winters, the thermometer fell so low that some
peach trees and grape vines growing near English Walnuts on the
Pomeroy farm near Lockport, N.Y. were killed, while the nut trees
were not in the least injured.
[Illustration]

The English Walnut at its Best.
A smooth, soft-shelled nut.
Meat full, with sweet, hickory-nut flavor.
Nuts fall clean and free from outside shuck.
Frosts harvest the nuts--in October.
They are self-pruning.
Require no care after arrival at bearing age.
An alkali sap keeps scales and pests from the trees.
Blossoms immune from late frosts, as they start late.
Pistillate and Staminate blossoms mature at same time in the best
varieties, insuring perfect fertilization and productivity.

Bears more regularly than other nut trees.
Bears heavier crops the older it becomes, unlike other fruit trees the
size and quality of whose fruit degenerates with age.

Interesting Figures about the English Walnut.
In Spain and Southern France there are trees believed to be more than
300 years old which bear from fifteen to eighteen bushels of nuts each,
annually.
In Whittier, California, is a famous tree which has been leased for a
term of years at $500.
Orchards seven and eight years old bring all the way from $1,000 to
$2,000 per acre and are a fine investment, yielding from 15 to 125 per
cent. according to age.
The total cost of producing and harvesting an English Walnut crop is
about one and one-half cents a pound.
[Illustration]

Kernels of Fact about the English Walnut.
The United States consumes more than 50,000,000 pounds a year.
The United States imports about 27,000,000 pounds a year.
The price is advancing steadily with the demand.
Besides being profitable, the English Walnut is