t tree top worked
at the same time to Siers. It bore two nuts in 1919. He also has a
mockernut tree top worked at the same time with Kirtland and which set
some nuts in 1919 but which dropped off before maturity. It set quite a
number in 1920. Mr. D. C. Snyder, Center Point, Iowa, has a shagbark
hickory some twenty-five or thirty years old which was top worked
shortly after it had begun to bear. In 1913 the four top limbs were top
worked to Fairbanks hickory, the rest of the tree being undisturbed. In
1915 these grafts bore nuts and have borne every year since. In 1919
they bore two quarts. Inasmuch as this was a year when the hickory crop
in that section was a failure it was thought to speak well for the
bearing of the Fairbanks hickory. In 1916 four grafts of Dennis hickory
were put in and three of Cedar Rapids. The Dennis grafts bore four nuts
in 1918 and over a dozen in 1919. The Cedarapids bore one dozen in 1919
besides a number more which a squirrel got before Mr. Snyder did. Mr.
William A. Baker of Wolcott, N. Y., top worked a bitternut tree to
Fairbanks in 1917 and the tree bore ten nuts in 1919. Mr. Harvey Losee,
Upper Red Hook, N. Y., grafted the young shoots of cut back hickories
and out of three shoots so grafted had them bear in three, four and five
years respectively. Dr. Morris has grafted a Taylor hickory on a small
tree which bore five years after grafting. Dr. Deming on his place at
Georgetown, Conn., has probably a greater collection of top worked
hickories of various varieties than anybody else. These trees are
growing finely and give promise of bearing early. A Taylor hickory on
stock 1-1/4" diameter grafted, April 26, 1918 had ten nuts on it on June
27, 1920. A Griffin hickory grafted in 1915 which is now 2-1/2" in
diameter had 81 nuts on it on the same date. There seems to be no
question but that anyone who has land with hickory trees one to four
inches in diameter can easily and quickly change them into orchards of
hickories bearing fine nuts by top working.

We next come to the relative merit of the various hickories of which we
know. I was fortunate in securing for the 1919 contest enough specimens
of the greater portion of those hickories which have been propagated
experimentally to a considerable extent so that some information on this
point can be given. The printed slip which I will pass around gives the
results of these tests and will give a better idea of the different nuts
than can be do