Walnut Growing in Oregon Part 1

Walnut Growing in Oregon.

by Various.

A COMING INDUSTRY OF GREAT NATIONAL IMPORTANCE

English walnuts for dessert, walnut confectionery, walnut cake, walnuts in candy bags at Christmas time--thus far has the average person been introduced to this, one of the greatest foods of the earth. But if the food specialists are heard, if the increasing consumption of nuts as recorded by the Government Bureau of Imports is consulted--in short, if one opens his eyes to the tremendous place the walnut is beginning to take among food products the world over, he will realize that the walnut's rank as a table luxury is giving way to that of a necessity; he will acknowledge that the time is rapidly approaching when nuts will be regarded as we now regard beefsteak or wheat products. The demand is already so great that purveyors are beginning to ask, where are the walnuts of the future to come from?

In 1902. according to the Department of Commerce and Labor, we imported from Europe 11,927,432 pounds of English walnuts; each year since then these figures have increased, until in 1906 they reached 24,917,023 pounds, valued at $2,193,653. In 1907 we imported 32,590,000 pounds of walnuts and 12,000,000 more were produced in the United States. In Oregon alone there are consumed $400,000 worth of nuts annually.

When we consider the limited area suitable to walnut culture in America--California and Oregon practically being the only territory of commercial importance--and the fact that the Old World is no longer planting additional groves to any appreciable extent, there being no more lands available, we begin to realize the important place Oregon is destined to take in the future of the walnut industry: for in Oregon, throughout a strip of the richest land known to man--the great Willamette basin with its tributary valleys and hills, an area of 60 by 150 miles--walnuts thrive and yield abundantly, and at a younger age than in any other locality, not excepting their original home, Persia.

In addition, Oregon walnuts are larger, finer flavored, and more uniform in size than those grown elsewhere; they are also free from oiliness and have a full meat that fills the sh.e.l.l well. These advantages are recognized in the most indisputable manner, dealers paying from two to three cents a pound more for Oregon walnuts than for those from other groves. Thus the very last and highest test--what will they bring in the market?--has placed the Oregon walnut at the top.

However, in all of Oregon, throughout the vast domain that seems to have been providentially created to furnish the world with its choicest nut fruit, there are, perhaps, not more than 200 acres in bearing at the present time. The test has been accomplished by individual trees found here and there all the way from Was.h.i.+ngton and Multnomah counties on the north, to Josephine and Jackson counties, bordering California. In a number of counties but two or three handsome old monarchs that have yielded heavy crops year after year, without a failure for the past twenty to forty years, bear witness to the soil's suitability; in other counties, notably Yamhill, st.u.r.dy yielding groves attest the soil's fitness. In none of the counties of the walnut belt has but the smallest fraction of available walnut lands been appropriated for this great industry. People are just beginning to realize Oregon's value as a walnut center and her destiny as the source of supply for the choicest markets of the future.

Were it practical to plant every unoccupied suitable acre in Oregon this year to walnuts, in eight or ten years the crop would establish Oregon forever as the sovereign walnut center of the world; and the crop, doubling each year thereafter for five years, as is its nature, and then maintaining a steady increase up to the twentieth year, would become a power in the world's markets, equal if not superior to that of North American wheat at the present time.

[Ill.u.s.tration: _More Nuts than Leaves. Tree of D. H. Turner._]

[Ill.u.s.tration: _Garden Stuff, Melons Pumpkins, Prunes and Children growing among the Walnuts. The Walnuts will in a Few Years put out all but the Children_]

The United States Year Book for 1908 estimates the food value of the walnut at nearly double that of wheat, and three times that of beefsteak.

Colonel Henry Dosch, the Oregon pioneer of walnut growing, says: "As a business proposition I know of no better in agricultural or horticultural pursuits."

Prof. C. I. Lewis, of the Oregon Experiment Station, writes: "In establis.h.i.+ng walnut groves we are laying the foundation for prosperity for a great many generations."

Mr. H. M. Williamson, secretary of the Oregon Board of Horticulture, writes: "The man who plants a walnut grove in the right place and gives it proper care is making provision not only for his own future welfare, but for that of his children and his children's children."

Felix Gillett, the veteran horticulturist of Nevada City, California, wrote shortly before his death: "Oregon is singularly adapted to raising walnuts."

Thomas Prince, owner of the largest bearing walnut grove in Oregon, expresses the most enthusiastic satisfaction with the income from his investment, and is planting additional groves on his 800-acre farm in Yamhill county, in many cases uprooting fruit trees to do so.

HISTORY IN BRIEF

The so-called "English" walnut originated in Persia, where it throve for many centuries before it was carried to Europe--to England, Germany, France, Spain and Italy--different varieties adapting themselves to each country. The name "walnut" is of German origin, meaning "foreign nut."

The Greeks called it "the Royal nut," and the Romans, "Jupiter's Acorn,"

and "Jove's Nut," the G.o.ds having been supposed to subsist on it.

The great age and size to which the walnut tree will attain has been demonstrated in these European countries: one tree in Norfolk, England, 100 years old, 90 feet high, and with a spread of 120 feet, yields 54,000 nuts a season; another tree, 300 years old, 55 feet high, and having a spread of 125 feet, yields 1,500 pounds each season. In Crimea there is a notable walnut tree 1,000 years old that yields in the neighborhood of 100,000 nuts annually. It is the property of five Tartar families, who subsist largely on its fruit.

In European countries walnuts come into bearing from the sixteenth to the twenty-fourth year; in Oregon, from the eighth to the tenth year; grafted trees, sixth year.

The first walnut trees were introduced into America a century ago by Spanish friars, who planted them in Southern California. It was not until comparatively recent years that the hardier varieties from France, adapted to commercial use, were planted in California and later in Oregon. They were also tried in other localities, but without success.

Since the prolific productiveness of the English walnut on the Pacific Coast has been a.s.sured, many commercial groves have been set out.

TEST TREES OF OREGON

The first walnut trees were planted in Oregon in limited number for purely home use, "just to see if they would grow," and they did. Thus the state can boast of single trees close to sixty years of age, each with admirable records of unfailing crops, demonstrating what a fortune would now be in the grasp of their owners had they planted commercially.

In Portland, Oregon, on what is known as the old Dek.u.m place, 13th and Morrison streets, there are two walnut trees, planted in 1869, that have yielded a heavy crop every fall since their eighth year, not a single failure having been experienced. The ground has never been cultivated.

The nuts planted were taken at random from a barrel in a grocery store.

During the "silver thaw" of 1907, the most severe cold spell in the history of Oregon, one of the trees was wrenched in two, but the dismembered limb, hanging by a shred, bore a full crop of walnuts the following season.

N. A. King, at 175 Twenty-first street, has some fine, old trees that have not missed bearing a good crop since their eighth year.

Henry Hewitt, living at Mt. Zion, Portland, an elevation of 1,000 feet, has many handsome trees, one, a grafted tree fifteen years old, that has borne since its fifth year. Another tree of his buds out the fourth of July and yields a full crop as early as any of the other varieties.

In Salem, there is what is known as the famous old Shannon tree, fully thirty years old, with a record of a heavy crop every season.

Mayor Britt, of Jacksonville, has a magnificent tree that has not failed in twenty years.

Dr. Finck, of Dallas, has a large tree seventeen years old that bore 70 pounds of nuts in its thirteenth year, and has increased ever since.

C. H. Samson, of Grants Pa.s.s, has a grove of 250 trees, now ten years old, that bore at seven years.

Mr. Tiffany, of Salem, has a fifteen-year-old tree that at thirteen years bore 115 pounds.

Mr. E. Terpening, of Eugene, has four acres of walnuts grafted on the American black, which in 1905 produced 700 pounds, in 1906 produced 1200 pounds, in 1907 produced 2000 pounds, and in 1908 produced 3000 pounds.

He tried seedlings first, but they were not satisfactory. The Epps and Reece orchard near Eugene produces about 100 pounds per tree, at 12 years of age.

Mr. Muecke, of Aurora, planted a dozen walnuts from his father's estate in Germany; they made a splendid growth, and at six years bore from 500 to 800 nuts to a tree.

Mr. Stober, of Carson Heights, planted nuts from Germany with satisfactory results.

Mrs. Herman Ankeny, of New Era, has seven young trees that in 1907 netted her $15 a tree.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Here is a Santa Barbara soft-sh.e.l.l on the lawn of Mr. E.

C. Apperson, in McMinnville, which at the age of eight years bore 32 pounds of walnuts. It stood the frosts and winter of 1908-'09 and bears every year; it is now 11 years old, 12 inches in diameter and has a branch spread of 40 feet.]

[Ill.u.s.tration: _The "Cozine" Walnut Tree_]

Cozine tree on A street, McMinnville. Seedling, 15 years old; bears good crop of nuts every year. At 14 years old the crop was 125 pounds. Is 16 inches in diameter and has a spread of 42 feet.

One sixteen-year-old tree near Albany netted its owner $30.

A Franquette walnut near Brownsville yielded eight bushels at ten years.

The French varieties planted in and around Vancouver commenced bearing at seven years, and have never failed. Prominent growers are A. A.