people. We have nations in this world where the resources, the possibilities of agriculture and all lines of human endeavor are as unlimited, almost, as ours, but they haven't the people and in the cases where they have people of the right kind, they haven't adopted the policies. It takes those three things for any county, any state or any nation to be really great, and it is indeed gratifying to those of us who believe in the highest development, the best for humanity, to come into a county where the people, through their industry, their policies of advancement, have made that county one of the best farmed agricultural counties in the United States; and that is saying a great deal when you consider the greatness of this nation and her immense wealth and resources. It is indeed gratifying to all of us who are spending some time and some effort to further somewhat the advancement of the country along horticultural lines, to be met with a cordial welcome and to come into this community that has so highly developed her various resources: so, on behalf of this Association and all its members, even the members that are not here, those of them who might, if they desired, take advantage of the Mayor's corkscrew and carnation bowl, I thank the Mayor and thank the citizens of this County and say that we are delighted to be among you. (Applause.)

The Chairman: We will now proceed with the regular order of business. As my paper happens to be placed first on the list, through the methods of the Secretary, I will ask Mr. Littlepage to kindly take the chair while I present notes on the subject of hybridizing nut trees.

THE PRACTICAL ASPECTS OF HYBRIDIZING NUT TREES

Dr. Robert T. Morris, New York

DR. ROBERT T. MORRIS OF NEW YORK
First President of the Association, 1911 and 1912

In the experimental work of hybridizing nut trees, we soon come to learn that a number of practical points need to be acquired before successful hybridizing can be done. This is a special field in which few have taken part as yet, and consequently any notes upon the subject will add to the sum total of the knowledge which we wish to acquire as rapidly as possible. First, in collecting pollen; it is important to shake our pollen into dry paper boxes. If we try to preserve the pollen in glass or in metal, it is attacked by various mould fungi and is rapidly destroyed. We have to remember that pollen consists of live cells which have quite as active a place in the organic world as a red squirrel, and the pollen grains need to breathe quite as much as a red squirrel needs to breathe. Therefore they must not be placed in glass or metal or tightly sealed. Further, the pollen grains need to be kept cool in order to avoid attacks from the greatest enemy of all organic life, the microbes or the lower fungi. Probably we may keep pollen for a longer time than it could ordinarily be kept, if it is placed in cold storage, but practically I have tried the experiment on only one occasion. Last year I wished to cross the chinkapin with the white oak. The white oak blossoms more than a month in advance of the chinkapin in Connecticut, and the question was how we could keep the white oak pollen. Some of it was placed in paper boxes in cold storage; some in paper boxes in the cellar in a dry place. Pollen which had been kept in the cellar and pollen which had been kept in cold storage were about equally viable. It is quite remarkable to know that pollen can be kept for more than a month under any circumstances. Hybridization occurred in my chinkapins from this white oak pollen. Sometimes, where the flowering time of such trees is far apart, it is important to know how we may secure pollen of one kind for the female flowers of the other. Two methods are possible. In the first place, we may secure pollen from the northern or southern range of a species for application upon pistillate flowers at the other end of the range of that species. Another way is to collect branches carrying male flowers before the flowers have developed, place them in the ice house or in a dark, cold room without light until the proper time for forcing the flowers, and if these branches are then placed in water, the water changed frequently as when we are keeping flowers carefully, the catkins or other male flowers will develop pollen satisfactorily a long time after their natural time of furnishing pollen, when they are brought out into the light. In protecting pistillate flowers from the pollen of their own trees, with the nut tree group where pollen is wind-borne rather than insect borne, I find that the better way is to cover the pistillate flowers with paper bags, the thinner the better, the kind that we get at the grocery store. It is best to pull off the undeveloped male flowers if they happen to be on the same branch with the female flowers, and then place the bags over the female flowers at about the time when they blossom, in advance of pollination of the male flowers. It is not safe to depend upon pulling off the male flowers of an isolated tree and leaving the female flowers without bags to protect them from pollen of the same species or of allied species, for the reason that wind may carry pollen to a great distance. One of Mr. Burbank's critics—I am sorry he has so many, for they are not all honest or serious—one of his critics, in relation to the crossing of walnuts, said that it was due to no particular skill on the part of Mr. Burbank, for, whenever the wind blew from the east, he regretted to say that his entire orchard of Persian walnuts became pollinized from the California black walnuts nearly half a mile away. This is an exaggeration, because the chances are that most of the Persian walnuts were pollenized from their own pollen, but in the case of some Persian walnuts blossoming early, and developing female flowers in advance of male flowers, pollen might be carried to them from half a mile away in a high wind from California black walnut trees. Black walnut pollen would then fertilize pistillate flowers of the Persian walnut. I have found this a real danger, this danger of wind-pollination at a distance, much to my surprise. Last year I pollinized one or two lower branches of female flowers of a butternut tree which had no other butternut tree within a distance of a good many rods, so far away that I had no idea that the pollen would be carried from the tree with male flowers to the one which happened to have female flowers only that year; consequently I placed pecan pollen on the female flowers of the lower branches of this butternut tree without protecting them with bags, and left the rest of the tree unguarded. There were no male flowers on that butternut tree that year. Much to my surprise, not only my pollinized flowers but the whole tree bore a good crop of butternuts. This year, on account of the drought, many of the hickory trees bore female flowers only. I do not know that it was on account of the drought, but I have noted that after seasons of drought, trees are apt to bear flowers of one sex or the other, trees which normally bear flowers of both sexes. This year a number of hickory trees bore flowers of one sex only, and I noted that some shagbark trees which had no male flowers had fairly good crops of nuts from pollen blown from a distance from other trees. I had one pignut tree (H. Glabra) full of female flowers which contained only one male flower, so far as I could discover and which I removed. On one side of this tree was a bitternut; on the other side a shagbark. This tree bore a full crop of pignuts,