San Marcos free press. [volume] (San Marcos, Tex.) 1877-1892, 1883-06-21
18th IN BLACK.wALNUT TREES.
...,.,ss Tells How Every Farmer can Become
RI,h-Youns Black Walnut Groves Sold
for $500 an Acre.


sou,HERN KANSAS, May 23.--A new
;,,syest in tree. planting has struck the
""nIe both in Dakota and Kansas.
IT, f On the st. Paul road in Dakota
.t ~ other day the settlers were talking
s ' walnut trees and the wonderful
aosltb to be realized in raising them.
sroupd Mitchell and Plankinton the
Inrans were coming prepared toplant
Ilsck.walnut tree claims.
Over in Logan valley, in Nebraska,
INST south of Sioux City, one man
has lust sold a young grove which he
ulanted ten years ago. This sale was
he first l have heard of, but it is
opening the eyes of the people to a
source of wealth surer and more
nro6table than an Arizona silver
mine. This Nebraska grove was sold
Nv Col. Van, of st. James, Neb., near
Wayne. DR.. R. B. Crawford, of
Wayne, who planted forty-seven
bushel of black walnuts last fall, tells
me that Col. Van was paid by an In
diana lumberman $4,000 for his ten
acre grove.
Il was ten years old. Col. Van
bought the land ten years ago for
s1,25 an acre. At the end of ten
wears he sold it for $500 per acre. If
he had put his entire farm of 100
acres into black walnuts ten years
AGO, it would have sold for $48,00O.
This sale, 1 say, has set the farmers
to thinking. DR.. Crawford told me
that he had ten acres of walnut trees
which he had refused $500 per acre
fo,-ten years old.
"Why do you refuse such price,"
Issked.
Because" said he, "they are worth
more money. They stand four hun
dred trees to the acre. When they
are twenty years old suppose I will
thin them out to 200 trees to the acre.
know every one of these 200 trees
when it is twenty years old will be
worth $40. believe my ten acre field
will be worth $4,000 an acre, or
$4,000. You can see what 200 trees
at $40 each would bring"
"Then you still have absolute faith
in the sure profits attending black
walnut culture?" asked.
"Yes sir, have. This case of Col.
Vans settles it. 1t also settles the
idea that we have not got to wait for
black-walnut trees to mature. We
can sell them three years or five years
DID,"
How do you plant your trees?" l
asked.
II put in forty-seven bushels of
black walnuts last year this way. |
put them in thin pile on the ground
in the fall. I spread straw over them
an inch thick. The rains and the
frost cracked them, and in the spring
Iplanted them in prepared ground
six foot one way and two foot the
other"
THAT is too thick, isn't it?" I
asked.
"Yes, that is too thick for perma-
nent use, but some of them will die.
By and by I will cut them out to a
stand four by six feet, and then |
will let the survival of the tittest
theory govern them. The strong ones
will kill out the week ones"
To DR.. Crawford's information l
will add my own. I saw nine acres
of black walnut timber, much of it
second growth, sold in Indiana last
winter for $4,000. They thought 1t
would average fifty years old: Many
Of the very largest trees had been cut
out. This was native forest. also
saw one tree sold for 5000. The lum-
herman who bought it said he could
get $3.50 for it when he sawed 1t into
boards. 1t was very large tree, and
there were good many bidders for
it. The tree was $50 years old. 80
this tree had gained in value over
$3.50 per year.
Isaw twenty trees near Jackson
vile, ILL.,, set out twenty-one years
ago, which were eighteen inches
through. They were worth $50 a
tee. So, young trees will gain a
dollar year in value, while old trees
will gain much faster. Trees increase
according to their age by the old the
DRY of light, heatan science radiatlng
nom common center. That is, they
increase inversely as the square root
Of their age.
The home of the black walnut is
In southern Kansas, Missouri and
Arkansas. Farmers along the santa
re road in Kansas tell me walnut