Dr. Cross: Mr. Chairman, ladies and gentlemen: The present status of the pecan industry in Oklahoma is the result of close cooperation between the growers and the experiment station combined with a resource which we have in that state consisting of thousands of native pecan trees which may be quickly and economically changed into producing trees instead of just wild forest trees. I am going to utilize my time this afternoon to discuss, first, briefly the present situation as we find it with reference to pecans in Oklahoma, because there is the important phase of nut growing which we follow in that state. We do grow some walnuts and we have a great many men interested in walnuts, but far and away our major interest is in pecans. We might divide the work and interest in the state into two phases. First, but of least importance, is that connected with the planting and production of varieties. We have a great many men in the state who wish to plant land to pecans, and, of course, in cases like that the varieties which are available are always selected for planting, and nursery trees, of course, are utilized. The latest phase of that type of development is the planting of apple trees for filler trees with the expectation that the apple trees will be removed after 15 or 20 years, thus leaving the pecan trees at a large size to fully occupy the ground, and in the meantime the apple trees, of course, have produced a profitable crop. Our growers, however, and the industry in the state are far more concerned with the utilization of the native trees. To talk about these native trees is almost--well, we might borrow a Texas expression--these trees grow both in Oklahoma and Texas--and the Texans say whenever a Texan tries to tell the truth everybody knows he is lying. That's the way everybody knows about some of these native trees. When we think of a huge, tall tree 20 or so feet in circumference over a hundred years of age and realize that the white man has occupied that particular territory for only a little over 50 years, we wonder about the history of that tree for the first 50 years of its life when wild Indians were roaming the territory and buffalo were grazing under these trees which were getting started. These trees occur along the streams, very seldom out away from the streams for any considerable distance, as one of the native forest trees and in sufficient number so that when all other trees are removed the stand of pecan trees remaining is in many cases more than adequate to make a complete stand of pecans for commercial production. So that after having removed the oaks and elms and cottonwoods and willows and the other native trees, we have the opportunity of making a considerable selection of desirable native or seedling trees by observing the type of nut which each tree produces.