Growing Nuts in the North | Page 6

are purple, having thick rounded scales and being abruptly
peaked at the apex. The seeds are wingless or have only very narrow
wings around them.
With the idea of getting practical results sooner, since nut trees mature

slowly, I interplanted my nut trees with varieties of apple, plum and
cherry. Doing so also served to economize on ground, since ultimately
nut trees require a great deal of space for best growth. Walnut trees, for
example, should be set 40 to 60 feet apart in each direction.
[Illustration: Pinus Flexilus nut seeds, Natural Size]
I learned a variety of facts during these first years of trial and error. I
discovered, for instance, that iron fence posts rust away in an acid soil;
that one must use cedar or oak. Conversely, in alkaline soil, iron will
last indefinitely, but that the nitrogenous bacteria will quickly rot
wooden posts. I found that the secret of growing hickories successfully
lies in giving them plenty of room, with no forest trees around to cut
off their supply of sunlight and air. I learned that it is impractical to
graft a large forest tree of butternut or hickory. Incidental to that, I
learned that a branch of a butternut tree which looks large enough to
support a man's weight near the trunk, will not do so when the branch is
green and alive, but that a dead branch of similar size will.
Contrariwise, even a small green limb of a bitternut-hickory will bear
my weight, but an old limb, though several inches thick, becomes so
brittle after it is dead for several years that it will break under slight
pressure. Fortunately, falls from trees do not usually result in serious
injuries but I did acquire quite a few bruises learning these distinctions.
There is always a natural mortality in planting trees, but in those first
years, lacking badly-needed experience, I lost more than 75%. Nearly
all of them started to grow but died during the first few winters. Those
which survived were the start of a nursery filled with hardy trees which
can endure the climate of the north. In looking back, I appreciate how
fortunate I was in having sought and received advice from experienced
nurserymen. Had I not done so, frequent failures would surely have
discouraged me. As it was, the successes I did have were an incentive
which made me persist and which left me with faith enough in an
ultimate success to go on buying seeds and trees and to make greater
and more varied experiments.
Chapter 3

BLACK WALNUTS
I have spent more of my time cultivating black walnuts than any other
kind of nut tree and given more of my ground area over to them. Yet it
was with no great amount of enthusiasm that I started working with
these trees. Obviously there could be nothing new or extraordinary
resulting from my planting trees of this species either on my farm or at
my St. Paul home, since there already were mature, bearing black
walnut trees at both places. It was only with the idea that they would be
an attractive addition to the native butternut groves that I decided to
plant some black walnut seedlings.
This did not prove feasible as I first attempted it. I had engaged a Mr.
Miller at St. Peter to procure wild black walnut trees for me since they
grew near that town. He was to dig these trees with as much of the root
system included as possible and ship them to my farm. But the winter
season came before this had been accomplished and both Mr. Miller
and I, deciding the idea was not as practical as we had hoped it would
be, abandoned it. Later that same autumn I found that a nursery just
outside of St. Paul had several rows of overgrown black walnut trees
which they would sell me quite reasonably. I bought them and sent
instructions to the tenant at my farm to dig twenty-eight large holes in
which to plant them. Packed in straw and burlap, the trees weighed
about 500 pounds, I found. This was much too heavy and cumbersome
to pack in my old touring car, so I hunted around for some sort of
vehicle I could attach to my car as a trailer. In an old blacksmith shop, I
came upon an antiquated pair of buggy wheels. They looked as though
they were ready to fall apart but I decided that with repairs and by
cautious driving, they might last out the trip of thirty-five miles. So I
paid the blacksmith his asking price--twenty-five cents. The spokes
rattled and the steel tires were ready to roll off their wooden rims but
the axles were strong. My father-in-law and I puttered and pounded,
strengthened and tightened, until