45 deg. below;
lowest known, 62 deg. below. Highest expected in summer, 101 deg.. Frequent
drouths? Yes. Hot, dry winds? Yes. Native nuts found plentifully? None.
Sparingly? None. Yet Mr. Young plants nut trees. It is men like that who
have made Canada what it is. It takes more than mere weather to stop
them. The never-say-die spirit of pioneers speaks throughout his report:

"Black walnuts, butternuts, some oaks, hazels and American chestnuts
(Ohio buckeyes) all came through last winter well. However, late frosts
reduced the nut crop. Of these species, filberts are not getting
anywhere. Winkler, I believe, will eventually make a go of it. Heartnuts
got a rough deal last winter, and European buckeye chestnuts were hurt a
little by late spring frosts. Some Manchurian walnuts also got a setback
with spring frosts, and some did not. Carpathian walnuts killed back
quite a lot, so did most of my hybrid walnuts. Hybrid hazels seem
perfectly hardy. Pecans, beechnuts and sweet chestnuts almost passed out
of the picture last winter. Giant hickory from Ontario seems hardy but
particular about the kind of soil and conditions. When irrigated, too
much water will kill them. And this is true also of walnut and butternut
seedlings. I have no acreage of nut trees. I grow seedlings and plant
them wherever I find a place protected from the stock and within reach
of moisture from the irrigation ditch, as this is a desert, cactus
country.

"I always have a stock of seedling trees on hand, and whenever visitors
show any interest, I give or send them fruit or nut trees and a few
perennial flowers. So there are sure to be a few nut trees, some day,
growing successfully throughout Alberta.

"There is more benefit from this northern seed, especially as I am using
a commercial pollen with the hope of getting a hardy white walnut with
possibly a coarse bark like the black to ward off sun-scald in this
climate. They are on their way. I don't know when we'll be eating these
imaginary nuts. However, it is not so long ago that fruit growing on the
cattle range was a dream. I grew the first pears in Alberta, so far as
we know. Now we are insulted if there is not a crop of fruit every year.
I have many seedlings of standard apples, unnamed, that are really
choice fruit, and, of course, a few named varieties that are doing
fairly well. Minnesota has done great work in apple and plum breeding
for the north. We are enjoying some of them right here.