Fort Worth weekly gazette. [volume] (Fort Worth, Tex.) 1882-1891, 1890-05-08
ON Planning q Pecan GROVE.

| Having read in late issue of TIE GAZETTE
your article on Pecan culture in Texas, write to
ask further information relative to what dis
lance apart the tree should be planted. pro-
Chillicothe, Tex. @. E. JONES.
The usual distance for the Southern
States east of Texas is thirty feet, but in
Texas, where the tree more inclines to
spread, forty feet lie near enough. The
best Texas authorities are pretty well
agreed on this. OF course, so far apart
will, at first thought, appear a good deal
like waste of land but it must be remem-
bered that the pecan is something put
there to stay, and that in thirty years it
will need all the space recommended
Some pecan growers plant twenty feet
apart, intending to cut out each alter
nate tree when they are large enough to
crowd each other. While this may work
we'll enough, it presents no advantage
that we can see. The trees will need to
come out before they have attainedsto
really profitable bearing, and we think
their roots in the soil will have done
more harm to the trees that are to req
main than will have been gained by thskF
product. AS a timber crop they will
probably be worth something, but If
timber should be our object 1t would be
better to plant some more rapidly grow
ing tree in their places.
1t would be many years before pecan
trees forty feet apart would much inter-
fere with the land occupied, hence it
could be used right along for other pur-
poses, the same as If the trees were not
there. The pecan tree is not bad tree
to interfere with surface culture, as its
roots incline to run deep.
There appears to be greater diversity
of opinion concerning how the pecan
should be planted, than there is relative
to the distance apart. We think there
should not be. The pecan in its present
condition Is simply a natural growth,
therefore, the best thing to do in plant
ing it is to pattern after nature as closely
as possible. That would lead MS to plant
the nuts at the season when they fall
from the trees, and to make the soil re-
oeiving them as much like the best natu-
raj pecan soil as practicable. If an illu-
vial soil along some stream is the
site of the proposed pecan grove there
is little else to do other than put
in the nuts; but if, on the other hand, it
is hard olayey OF waxy soil, then we
think, n considerable hole should be dug
out for each hill, and fill with mold
soil rich in decompossd vegetable mat
ter. Nothing like giving the young tree
a good send-off at the very start. 1t is
naturally a tap-root tree, and 1t cannot
make first class growth until it gets
tap-root well down. In its infancy, so to
speak, it Is weak and unable to do much
in the way of sending down a tap-root
through hard ground, but If favored in
this matter for year or so it has gath
cred such strength that its forcing powers
will be equal to almost any occasion.
We have IN mind some pecan trees that
clearly substantiate the correctness of
this position. There are ten of them.
Nine were planted without any special
preparation, but the tenth was planted
over an abandoned old well that had been
filled by simply wheeling in surface soil
from the immediate neighborhood. They
are now fifteen years old, and that tree
in the old we'll is near twice as large as
either of the others.
Professor W. C Stubs, of the Louisi-
ana experiment station, recommends al
fertilizer for the pecan grove to be ap-
piled in case the land il not naturally
rich enough. He says the younger un-
bearing trees require very different fer
tilizer from those bearing. For the for
mer use 1000 pounds cotton seed meal,
600 pounds high grade acid phosphate,
400 pounds ksiuit. In case phosphate |
and kainit cannot be conveniently had,
bone mesl and cotton hull ashes may be |
used. In using these mixtures 1t should |
be spread around the tree (broadoasted) |
apon an area of circle whose radius is the |
height of the tree, and lightly plowed |
and narrowed in. Apply from five to |
fifty pounds to each tree, according to |
size.