Growing Nuts in the North - A Personal Story of the Author's Experience of 33 Years - with Nut Culture in Minnesota and Wisconsin

Carl Weschcke

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The Project Gutenberg EBook of Growing Nuts in the North, by Carl Weschcke This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org Title: Growing Nuts in the North A Personal Story of the Author's Experience of 33 Years with Nut Culture in Minnesota and Wisconsin Author: Carl Weschcke Release Date: April 17, 2006 [EBook #18189] Language: English Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 *** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK GROWING NUTS IN THE NORTH *** Produced by Stacy Brown, Marilynda Fraser-Cunliffe and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net GROWING NUTS IN THE NORTH A personal story of the author's experience of 33 years with nut culture in Minnesota and Wisconsin. Includes his failures as well as final successes. Scientific as well as readable for the amateur horticulturist with many illustrations. Tells how to grow and to propagate nut bearing trees and shrubs. By CARL WESCHCKE Published WEBB PUBLISHING CO. ST. PAUL, MINNESOTA, U.S.A. 1953 Copyright 1954 CARL WESCHCKE ST. PAUL, MINNESOTA Introduction GROWING NUTS IN THE NORTH Only a few books have been written on the subject of nut trees and their bearing habits, and very little of that material applies to their propagation in cold climates.

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• Publié par: tekeh
• Publié le: 08 décembre 2010
• Nombre de lectures: 35
• Langue: English
• Poids de l'ouvrage: 1 Mo

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The Project Gutenberg EBook of Growing Nuts in the North, by Carl Weschcke

This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or
re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org

Title: Growing Nuts in the North
A Personal Story of the Author's Experience of 33 Years
with Nut Culture in Minnesota and Wisconsin

Author: Carl Weschcke

Release Date: April 17, 2006 [EBook #18189]

Language: English

Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1

*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK GROWING NUTS IN THE NORTH ***

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GROWING NUTS IN THE NORTH

A personal story of the author's
ienx pMeirniennecseo toaf a3n3d yeWairssc ownitshi nn. uItn ccluultduerse
his failures as well as final successes.

Scientific as well as readable for the
amateur horticulturist with many
illustrations. Tells how to grow and to
propagate nut bearing trees and
shrubs.

By CARL WESCHCKE

Published
ST. WPEABUBL , PMUIBNLNIESSHIONTGA , CUO..S.A.
3591

Copyright 1954
CARL WESCHCKE
ST. PAUL, MINNESOTA

Introduction

GROWING NUTS IN THE NORTH

Only a few books have been written on the subject of nut trees and their
bearing habits, and very little of that material applies to their propagation in cold
climates. For these reasons I am relating some of the experiences I have had in
the last thirty-two years in raising nut trees in Wisconsin. To me, this has been a
hobby with results both practical and ornamental far beyond my original
conception. I hope that the information I am giving will be of help and interest to
those who, like myself, enjoy having nut-bearing trees in their dooryards, and
that it will prevent their undergoing the failures and disappointments I
sometimes met with in pioneering along this line. Since my purpose is to give
advice and assistance to those whose interest parallels mine by relating my
successes and failures and what I learned from each, I have included only
those details of technique which are pertinent.
It is a fine thing to have a hobby that takes one out-of-doors. That in itself
suggests healthful thought and living. The further association of working with
trees, as with any living things, brings one into the closest association with
nature and God. I hope this book may help someone achieve that attitude of
life, in which I have found such great pleasure and inner satisfaction.
Anyone wishing to make a planting of a few nut trees in his dooryard or a small
orchard planting should join the Northern Nut Growers' Association. This
Association can be joined by writing the current secretary, but since that office
may be changed from time to time, persons applying for membership should
write George L. Slate of Geneva Experiment Station, Geneva, New York, or Dr.
H. L. Crane, Principal Horticulturist, U. S. Department of Agriculture, Bureau of
Plant Industry, Beltsville, Maryland, or the Author. The first president was Dr.
Robert T. Morris, New York City, N. Y., 1910-1911, the Association being
founded by Dr. W. C. Deming of Westchester, New York, who called the first
meeting in 1910.
Each year a report was printed of the proceedings of the Annual Meeting and
exclusive of the 1952 meeting, the Reports which are in substantial book form
number forty-two. Most of these Reports can be obtained by writing to the
secretary, the total library of these Reports constituting one of the best
authorities for nut tree planting in the northern hemisphere of the United States
than any extant.

The author acknowledges with thanks the consistent encouraging praise from
his father, Charles Weschcke, of the work involved in nut growing experiments,
also for his financial assistance, thus making the publication of this book
possible and available to readers at a nominal price.
The editor of the greater part of this book, Allison Burbank Hartman (a
descendent of the great Luther Burbank), is entitled to great praise and thanks
for the interest and work she put forth.
Grateful acknowledgment is made to William Kuehn, the artist. He had been
associated with the author in Boy Scout work, also became a part of the nut
growing experiments in Northern Wisconsin, which work was interrupted by
World War II.
Acknowledgment is hereby made with gratitude to Dr. J. W. McKay of the U. S.
Department of Agriculture, Washington, D. C.; Harry Weber of Cincinnati, Ohio;
Ford Wilkinson, Rockport, Ind.; Fayette Etter, Lehmasters, Pa.; Dr. W. C.
Deming, Litchfield, Conn.; Clarence A. Reed, Washington, D. C.; Dr. J. Russell
Smith, Swarthmore, Pa.; George S. Slate, Urbana, Ill.; Herman Last, Steamboat
Rock, Iowa, and many other professors and horticulturists who lent their time
and effort assisting me in my experiments throughout the years. And last but not
least, the author is indebted to his secretary, Dorothy Downie, for tireless efforts
in re-writing the manuscript many times which was necessary in compiling this
.koob

GROWING NUTS IN THE NORTH

Contents

Introduction
Chapter 1
First Encounters
Chapter 2
First Attempts
Chapter 3
Black Walnuts
Hazels and
Chapter 4
Filberts
Chapter 5
Hazels and/or
Filberts
Chapter 6
Pecans and Their
Hybrids
Chapter 7
Hickory the King
Chapter 8
Butternut
Pioneering With
Chapter 9
English Walnuts
in Wisconsin
Chapter 10
Other Trees
Chapter 11
Pests and Pets
Storing and
Chapter 12
Planting Seeds
Chapter 13
Tree Planting
Methods
Winter Protection

Chapter 14
of Grafts and
Seedlings
Chapter 15
Tree Storage
Chapter 16
GrSauftgingge sMtieotnhso odsn
Chapter 17
VGrearfstiunsg RTaaffpiae
Chapter 18
Eoffne cUtnsl iokf e GSrtaoftcinksg
Chapter 19
ChaDriastcitnegriusitischsi nogf
Scions
Chapter 20
Hybridizing
Chapter 21
TrTeoexsi caitnyd APmlaonntsg
Conclusion

Chapter 1
FIRST ENCOUNTERS
Almost everyone can remember from his youth, trips made to gather nuts.
Those nuts may have been any of the various kinds distributed throughout the
United States, such as the butternut, black walnut, beechnut, chestnut, hickory,
hazel or pecan. I know that I can recall very well, when I was a child and visited
my grandparents in New Ulm and St. Peter, in southern Minnesota, the
abundance of butternuts, black walnuts and hazels to be found along the roads
and especially along the Minnesota and Cottonwood river bottoms. Since such
nut trees were not to be found near Springfield, where my parents lived, which
was just a little too far west, I still associate my first and immature interest in this
kind of horticulture with those youthful trips east.
The only way we children could distinguish between butternut and black walnut
trees was by the fruit itself, either on the tree or shaken down. This is not
surprising, however, since these trees are closely related, both belonging to the
family
Juglans
. The black walnut is known as
Juglans nigra
and the butternut or
white walnut as
Juglans cinera
. The similarity between the trees is so
pronounced that the most experienced horticulturist may confuse them if he has
only the trees in foliage as his guide. An experience I recently had is quite
suggestive of this. I wished to buy some furniture in either black walnut or
mahogany and I was hesitating between them. Noting my uncertainty, the
salesman suggested a suite of French walnut. My curiosity and interest were
immediately aroused. I had not only been raising many kinds of walnut trees,
but I had also run through my own sawmill, logs of walnut and butternut. I felt
that I knew the various species of walnut very thoroughly. So I suggested to
:mih"You must mean Circassian or English walnut, which is the same thing. It
grows abundantly in France. You are wrong in calling it French walnut, though,
because there is no such species."
He indignantly rejected the name I gave it, and insisted that it was genuine

[Pg 3]

French walnut.
"Perhaps," I advised him, "that is a trade name to cover the real origin, just as
plucked muskrat is termed Hudson seal."
That, too, he denied. We were both insistent. I was sure of my own knowledge
and stubborn enough to want to prove him wrong. I pulled a drawer from the
dresser of the "French walnut" suite and asked him to compare its weight with
[Pg 4]
that of a similar drawer from a black walnut suite nearby. Black walnut weighs
forty pounds per cubic foot, while butternut weighs only twenty-five. He was
forced to admit the difference and finally allowed my assertion to stand that
"French walnut" was butternut, stained and finished to simulate black walnut.
Since it would have been illegal to claim that it was black walnut, the attractive
but meaningless label of "French walnut" had been applied. Although it is less
expensive, I do not mean to imply that butternut is not an excellent wood for
constructing furniture. It ranks high in quality and is p