title="[Pg 16]"/> beginning of the quarter year immediately following date of joining. This would give every member a full year at least before he would again receive a notice for dues.

It would be quite inconvenient to date each membership from the day of joining. It would not be so bad if members paid promptly on receipt of notice.

Or a rebate might be made for each month of the year elapsed before new members' dues were paid.

Meetings

No field meeting was held this year. It has been suggested, and would seem to be a favorable subject for discussion, that it might be well to hold our annual meeting late in the year in some central location, such as New York City, Philadelphia or Washington, for our business and formal program of papers and discussions, and the study of the nuts sent in, perhaps for judging any competition that might be held, if the meeting were late enough for that; and a summer meeting of informal nature at some place where nut trees with their crops growing could be studied.

Nut Journal

Our official organ, the American Nut Journal, has done its part well through the past year and is becoming, as it should, a very important element in the success of the purposes of this Association. Most new and old members of the Association have availed themselves during the year of the offer of membership and the Journal for $2.50. In spite of the reduction of 25 cents on each membership, the receipts for dues have increased from $273 to $331. I would suggest that the membership fee be still further reduced by 25 cents, when combined with subscription to the Journal, if the editor is willing to continue the present arrangement whereby the price of the Journal is reduced to 75 cents when subscribed to with membership, so that the two together will cost $2.25. Another year it may be possible to make a similar reduction. The object toward which we ought to work is membership for $1, and membership with the Journal$2. I should like to hear the opinions of the members as to the advisability of working to reduce our dues to $1 annually.

How Members May Help

At the risk of monotony I will repeat my concluding remarks of last year and ask that each member help increase the prosperity and usefulness of the Association by enlisting new members, by advertising his business in the annual report, and by paying his dues promptly. The secretary would much rather spend his time answering questions and imparting such information as lies in his power, than to have to send repeated notices to members in arrears for dues.

The secretary will be happy at all times to learn of the plans and progress of the members.

The President: You have heard the report of the secretary. There are two things to be done with it. It is, as you will notice, first a report of the year's business and, second, it has certain suggestions for your consideration. I think that as a business report we can discuss and move its adoption, amendment or rejection. After that we may take up the suggestions.

[Adoption moved, seconded and carried.]

He has brought before our consideration the amount of dues, and the question of their payment. I doubt the advisability of a lengthy discussion in this business meeting. I think it better to refer it to the executive committee. Unless I hear further suggestions, I will take that action. The next piece of business is the matter of the report on the amendments to the constitution. Professor Close and the secretary were appointed a committee for this matter, and as Professor Close cannot be here, we will hear from the secretary on the matter. (See amended constitution.)

Dr. Smith: I am now glad to announce that we have covered the necessary business ground, and now come to the real meat of the meeting. We have with us this morning Dr. Baker, Dean of the State College of Forestry, at Syracuse, who is going to address us on the subject of "The Relation of Forestry Conditions in New York to Possibilities of Nut Growing."

THE RELATION OF FOREST CONDITIONS IN NEW YORK TO POSSIBILITIES OF NUT GROWING

Dr. Hugh P. Baker, Dean of The New York State College
of Forestry at Syracuse University

The forester presumes to come before your organization because he is concerned with one of the greatest of the natural resources of this and other states of the Union and not with the idea of bringing information as to details in nut culture. Possibly nut culture as a business is more closely related to agriculture than forestry. Forestry is not subordinate to agriculture in this country but co-ordinate with it. Together they will come as near solving the soil problems of the country as is possible for man to solve them.

The forester is interested and concerned with the wild nut trees wherever he has to do with the forests or forest lands of the country. Throughout the great hardwood sections of the East there are many native nut-bearing trees, and in the proper utilization of the trees which make up the forests the forester is concerned not alone with the lumber which may come from these trees, but he is concerned as well with the value of the by-products of the forest and the influence of the utilization of these by-products upon the forest.

In view of the forester's interest in all of the trees which make up our forests, my purpose of addressing you today is to bring before you the question of the most effective use of the forest soils of this state. I shall also attempt to make some suggestions to your organization in the matter of interesting the man on the street in nut growing. This profession and the business of forestry have been passing through a period of general educational work in this country. Some of the lessons which we have learned through our efforts to interest the people in their forests may be of help to you in interesting the people both in the consumption and the production of nuts.

New York as a Great Forest State

Twenty-five years ago New York was one of the leading lumber-producing states of the Union. Today some twenty other states produce more lumber than comes from the forests and woodlots of New York. Statistics given out recently by the United States Census Bureau and the Conservation Commission of New York show that, out of the land acreage of over thirty-two millions in New York, but twenty-two millions are included within farms. This leaves something over eight millions of acres outside of farms and presumably non-agricultural. The forests of the Adirondacks and Catskills and the woodlots of the rougher hill counties in the southern and southwestern part of the state come within this vast area of eight millions of acres. Without doubt with increasing population there will come some increase in the use of what are now non-agricultural lands for the practice of agriculture, but with three hundred years of agricultural history back of us in this state it does not seem likely that there will be much change in the relation of non-agricultural to agricultural land during the next half-century.

Out of the twenty-two millions of acres of farm lands in the state but fifteen millions are actually under cultivation, leaving, therefore, from six to eight millions of acres within the farms of the state but lying idle. That is, we have a Massachusetts enclosed within our farms which is non-productive as far as direct returns are concerned. Yet there is really no waste land in New York, as every square foot of the state which is covered with any soil at all is capable of producing good forest trees. It is this great area of idle land enclosed within our farms which seems to have unusual promise in the development of nut culture in the state. There is