The morning news. [volume] (Savannah, Ga.) 1887-1900, 1888-12-03
The Pecan.

An undoubtedly rich but, as yet, COM
paratively unworked resource of the lower
south is the pecan. OF course it is not eli
maticaEly secured to the extreme lower
south, for it is growth hardy in most of
the southern states, so called, but in the
lower south it invariably gives its best re-
suits, says the Mobile Register. There is
no experiment. pending relative to what it
car bel made to do here, or relative to its
proftab leness as crop-both Of these things
have often been entirely settled. A few
davs ago r. F. Gould showed us some pc
cans g1own on his place at Battles Wharf,
Baldwin, county that could not have been
beaten by anything in that line produced
in either Texas or Mexico, the region
wherein the pecan is understood to attain
to its greatest perfection. They measured
about inches in length, had thin shells
and we're entirely well filed. He has on his
place two trees bearing fruit of this char
acter-they are twelve years old, and this
season will yield rs pounds of nuts each,
and there is aireadya standing bid FOR the
product att 20 cent per pound.
OF course this will not be looked upon as
growing and doing well here and there
all over the country, the only trouble con-
nected with the matter Ii in the fact that
there is not enough of them, no one appear
ing to have thought of going regularly
into pecan culture for profit.
A book entitled Chow to Get Rich in the
South" treating on the pecan, among
many other good things we have here, says
it requires no care once it gets start. The
first few years of its life finds it compare
lively slow growth, but once it gets well up,
with tap-root deep in the ground, its
growth is much more rapid. In raising it
from the seed you are not sure Ct obtaining
tree that will produce as good nuts as
those you plant, and hence the surest way
to secure exactly what you want is to plant
YOUR pecans where you want the trees to
grow las it does not do so well transplanted)
and then when of proper size for stocks
graft or bud upon them scions or buds Sc
cured from tree that produces the large
paper-shen pecans. This will add some
what to the cost of your grove, but it will
also largely increase your profits when your
grove gets to bearing.
One reason the pecan is not cultivated
more generally is on account of having to
wait ten or twelve years for them to be in
profitable bearing The writer is probably
correct in this, but it is a great mistake on
the part of the people, and fortunately a
popularity of this country. If the people
of other countries went on the immediate
returns principle as they do here, there
would be no olive culture. for it takes the
olive as long to come into profitable bearing
as it takes the pecan. Then waiting for the
pecan grove would bring on no loss, as the
land of the grove might be in constant use
for other crops. The writer referred to goes
on to state that you can count
sure on 40 bushels of nuts to
the acre the twelfth year, worth
from 81 to 81 per bushel. After they COM
mencs to bear, the yield will increase each
year, andItrees 20 years old will bear
bushels on tree, and at 80 years of age
they will bear 10 bushels to tree A 90
acre grove would cost: Twenty acres of
land at S10-S200; cost of nuts and plant
ing 5000; interest and taxes twelve years
$500; total cost-$760.