n't understand too well at the present time.

I now call on Dr. McKay to present his paper. Dr. McKay.

A Promising New Pecan for the Northern Zone

J. W. MCKAY and H. L. CRANE[2]

In late 1949 Professor A. F. Vierheller, Extension Horticulturist at the
University of Maryland, College Park, obtained two small pecans from an
exhibit at the Prince Georges County Fair, Upper Marlboro, Maryland,
which he sent to the Office of Nut Investigations at Beltsville,
Maryland. These nuts were very thin shelled and contained solid, well
developed kernels very light in color and attractive. We gave them no
particular heed until the fall of 1951, when the authors together with
Professor Vierheller, P. E. Clark, County Agent of Prince Georges
County, visited the tree on which they had been produced. We found also
a number of other pecan trees nearby. All of them were on an old
southern Maryland estate known as Brookfield. The present owner is John
C. Duvall, whose address is Naylor, a small southern Maryland community
located about 25 miles southeast of Washington, D. C. in the heart of
the tobacco growing area.

_Origin of the Duvall trees_: The present trees probably grew from nuts
sent to Maryland from the vicinity of Iron Mountain, Missouri, by a
friend of the Duvall family named Mrs. Mary Medora Johnson. Mrs. Johnson
had lived in Maryland as a neighbor of the Duvall family and when she
moved to Missouri she apparently was so impressed with the native pecan
that she sent nuts to her friends in Maryland for planting. This must
have happened about 1850 since the oldest trees at Brookfield are
estimated to be about 100 years old and Mrs. Johnson was a friend of
John C. Duvall's grandmother. In terms of the human life span the trees
are thus three generations removed from the time of planting, a time
period which fits fairly well the estimated age of 100 years based upon
size of the trees.

_Description_: The three largest trees are approximately equal in size
and undoubtedly represent the original planting. The eight other trees
are all smaller and could well have originated as seedlings of the
original three. Five of the largest trees have been given numbers 1 to 5
and will be referred to by number. Duvall No. 1, 2 and 5 are the three
large trees situated more or less in a circle surrounding the old
mansion, each about 100 yards from the others. The smaller trees are
located more or less between and around the larger on