It is well to mention the filbert and hazel. While not really trees the filbert sometimes reaches a height of 5 ft. or more with very luxuriant foliage in the summer and in the early spring the catkins are very prominent and attractive. There is no reason why the filbert should not be grown more extensively even though it is affected by blight or canker. We are assured that this can be readily cut away with less trouble than the ordinary treatment of trees.
Of the hazel there are two kinds, the common hazel and beaked hazel, both native here. While the nuts of these shrubs are really too small to be of any commercial value yet I believe we will find nuts growing somewhere that are as large as our imported filberts.
Of the pines and evergreens there are a number which produce nuts of which Dr. Morris has told us. Some of them are rapid growing trees and there seems to be good reason why we should not plant out evergreens which produce fruit and are just as attractive and fine as those evergreens which produce shade only.
I have not mentioned one tree which I believe to be the most promising for this locality--that is the pecan. It has been demonstrated that we can grow the pecan on our native hickories and from what I have seen of the wonderful growth of the first year of the bud I am sure we will be able to produce as fine pecans as can be produced in any section of the country, and further than that, we have an unlimited number of native hickories on which we can graft this finest of nuts. The pecan is hardy in this locality and farther north. I have seen it grown to a fair sized tree in Connecticut. I have seen it on the south side of Long Island and have seen one tree planted possibly over 100 years near Oyster Bay, L. I. which today is more than 3 ft. in diameter and reaches possibly 75 ft. in height. The pecan, too, is fruiting on Long Island and I believe we will have it fruiting in this locality within the next two or three years. During the last few years I have talked with numbers of people, many of them owners of large estates who could hardly believe it is possible to grow the English walnut and pecan in this latitude.
I have said that were we to limit our shade trees to those trees alone which produce edible nuts we would then have a greater assortment than one could hardly suppose. Each and every one of the trees I have mentioned were they not to produce a single nut would in themselves equal or surpass almost any tree in beauty and majesty.