The other American hazel, variously known as the beaked hazel, tailed hazel or horned hazel, was named Corylus cornuta by Marshall (Arbustrum Americanum 37, 1785).  Consequently, that is the name by which it should be known instead of the name Corylus rostrata which was bestowed subsequently.  This hazel has a much more northern range than the common American hazel and I have seen it in Labrador and in Ontario nearly to Hudson’s Bay.  On the Pacific coast it is said to reach a height of thirty feet.  Although spreading by stoloniferous roots like the common American hazel, these roots are shorter, and it does not extend rapidly enough to dominate the situation when growing in competition with the common hazel.

The nuts, while very good, and sometimes of large size with comparatively thin shell, lack quality, a very important element in any nut.  It is probable that this tailed hazel will be valuable for adding hardiness to hybrids with the European and Asiatic hazels, when the time comes for horticulturists of Canada to make fortunes from their hazel orchards.

In Europe and Asia and in the northern parts of Africa several species of hazels are extremely important commercially, sometimes furnishing the chief source of income for large districts, very much as wheat or corn make special crops over large areas in this country.

These foreign hazels have not been raised successfully in our country, excepting very recently on the northwest coast.  The reason for failure depends almost wholly upon the presence of a blight, Cryptosporella anomala, which belongs to our native hazels.  In the course of evolution, host and parasite have come to be peers of each other, and consequently this blight does not menace our native hazels very seriously.  Introduced species, with the exception, perhaps, of the Byzantine hazel, appear to carry a protoplasm which has not learned to resist the attacks of the blight.  All organic warfare is fundamentally enzymic in its nature, and it is possible that through process of natural selection some of the foreign hazels would eventually become securely established in this country, without aid from the nurseryman.

As a matter of fact, the hazel blight is very easily managed.  Not knowing this at first, I allowed almost all of my exotic hazels to become destroyed, and a number of nurserymen told me of having given up the problem as hopeless.  Recently I have learned of the ease with which the disease may be controlled, and now feel very comfortable in its presence.

The blight is of slow development and chooses the larger hazel stems for its battleground.  All that one notices at first is a depression of the bark extending in the long axis of a large branch.  If one observes more closely, he will find spore-bearing pustules occurring as little round elevations upon the depressed part of the bark.  The blight proceeds slowly, and I pass about for examination specimens