=Varieties of the Western Shellbark.=--The typical form of the thick or Western shellbark (_H. laciniosa_) has already been shown on a preceding page, but some remarkable and valuable varieties have been found in the Western States, and no doubt others will be, when more attention is paid than at present to the natural food products of our forests. The tendency of this species, in its variations, is usually in the direction of an elongation of the nuts, even when there is no decrease in the thickness of the shell, as shown in Fig. 65, taken from one of a number of long varieties collected in the Western States; and while they do not possess any special merit, they attract attention, owing to their unusual form. [Illustration: FIG. 65. LONG WESTERN SHELLBARK.] [Illustration: FIG. 66. FRESH NUSSBAUMER HYBRID.] NUSSBAUMER'S HYBRID.--Several years ago I received a specimen of a very remarkable nut from Judge Samuel Miller, of Bluffton, Mo., under the name of "Nussbaumer's Hybrid Pecan." Judge Miller informed me that he had received it from Mr. J. J. Nussbaumer, Mascoutah, St. Clair Co., Ill., who claimed that it was a hybrid between the pecan and the large western shellbark hickory (_H. laciniosa_). I had an illustration made of this specimen, and it appeared, with a brief description, in the _American Agriculturist_ for Dec., 1884, p. 546. Soon after receiving the specimen nut from Judge Miller I opened correspondence with Mr. Nussbaumer, and learned from him that only one tree bearing such nuts had ever been found, and this was of large size, six and a half feet in circumference, and about fifty feet high, the bark somewhat like that of the hickory but nearer the pecan. Mr. Nussbaumer sent me specimens of the green nuts with leaves and twigs, from the original tree. The nuts, however, of that season (1884), were badly infested with the "hickory-shuck worm" (_Grapholitha caryana_, Fitch), and these had so ruined the shucks, and even eaten into the shells of the nuts, that few of the specimens received were fully developed. But from two nuts I had a sketch made while they were fresh and of natural size, as shown in Fig. 66, the dark, irregular marks on the husks showing where the shuck worm had attacked them. One of these nuts is shown in Fig. 67, also natural size. I planted one of the nuts, from which I now have a tree about ten feet high, but although ten years old it has not fruited, and, so far as I can judge from its appearance, is a pure Western shellbark, with no indication of hybridity; but of course this does not prove that the original or parent tree is not a hybrid, as claimed by Mr. Nussbaumer, Judge Miller, and, if I am rightly informed, Prof. T. J. Burrill, of the University of Illinois. [Illustration: FIG. 67. NUSSBAUMER'S HYBRID.]