Although many of these filberts bore nuts the first year they were
planted, within two years they were all completely winter-killed.

In 1932, I received ten filbert bushes from J. U. Gellatly of West Bank,
British Columbia. These consisted of several varieties of Glover's best
introductions and some Pearson seedlings. I planted them on the south
side of a high stone wall, a favorable location for semi-hardy plants.
They appeared to be thrifty and only slightly winter-killed during the
first two years but by 1939, all but two of the bushes had died or were
dying. Although as nut-bearing plants they have been of little value to
me, their pollen has been of great service.

I found an unusually fine wild hazel growing in the woods on my farm and
in 1934, I began an experiment in hybridizing it. I crossed the
pistillate flowers of the native hazel with pollen from a Gellatly
filbert and obtained four hybrid plants, which I have called hazilberts.
In the spring of 1940, three of these hybrids had pistillate flowers but
no staminate blooms. As I was very eager to see what the new crosses
would be like, I fertilized the blossoms with a gunshot mixture of
pollen from other plants such as the Winkler hazel, the European filbert
and the Jones hybrid hazel. Certain difficulties arose in making these
hybrids, mainly due to the curiosity of the squirrels who liked to rip
open the sacks covering the blossoms which were being treated. Deer
mice, too, I found, have a habit of climbing the stems of hazel bushes
and gnawing at the nuts long before they are mature enough to use for
seed. Later I learned to protect hybrid nuts by lacing flat pieces of
window screening over each branch, thus making a mouse-proof enclosure.
Even after gathering the nuts I discovered that precautions were
necessary to prevent rodents from reaching them. The best way I found to
do this is to plant nuts in cages of galvanized hardware cloth of 2 by 2