...Ukraine has its own Atlantis! It cannot be found on the map, but its inhabitants survived after their homes went to the bottom. Very often, local residents leave their cozy homes and go to see the place where their settlement used to be, but now there is an endless expanse of water. This place attracts them like a magnet - their grandfathers and great-grandfathers lived there.

The first written references to the village of Khudyaki in the Cherkasy region date back to 1649. According to historians, this village has existed since 1500. This is how the inhabitants of the village of Khudyaki would have lived to this day, if it were not for the creation of the Kremenchug Reservoir in 1957-1961 - the largest of the six reservoirs in the cascade on the Dnipro River. At that time, two hundred villages in Cherkasy region went under water during the creation of the Kremenchuk Sea (as it is also called) with a total area of 2,250 square kilometers.

And in 2009, in memory of the village of Khudyaki, which was flooded by the reservoir, the first monument to flooded villages in Ukraine was erected in the present village of Khudyaki, Cherkasy district...

But it was not in search of Ukrainian Atlantis that the specialists of the Ukrainian Nut Association came to this village - currently in this village there is a hazelnut nursery of a member of the Ukrainian Nut Association, Serhii Kuchugurny, who hospitably invited us to his place.

The production interest in growing seedlings in this nursery was finally formed after the analysis of the growth of American varieties of hazelnuts grafted on bear nut, which were brought from the nursery of Serhiy Kuchugurnyi last fall and planted in one of the experimental garden plots of the nut association, located in the Krynychan district of the Dnipropetrovsk region.

All seedlings grown and grafted by Serhiy Kuchugurny show friendly and confident growth dynamics.

Without exaggeration, Serhiy Kuchugurnyi can be called a hereditary gardener. Father Vasyl Hryhorovych instilled in Sergiy a love for the garden, who, after graduating from Belotserkiv Agrarian University, professionally engaged in gardening. The yield and quality of apples, pears, and grapes under the "supervision" of Vasyl Hryhorovych can be envied by any professional orchard.

Serhii decided to keep up with his father - he created a hazelnut nursery. Hazelnut growing always attracted Serhiy, especially after meeting and communicating with a real professional Igor Tsybenko.

Currently, Serhiy has collected well-known Ukrainian and foreign varieties and forms of hazelnuts on two plots of the nursery, which Serhiy's assistants are skillfully consulting on. Based on the independent and careful work of Serhiy's assistants, we can conclude that the work in the nursery is well organized. And this is an important factor in the organization of industrial cultivation of seedlings of good quality.

Seeing that I was watching the work of his assistants, Sergey said, smiling: - "My father taught me: if you want to get a high-quality result with joint work, train your assistants carefully."

In order to grow high-quality seedlings, Serhiy constantly studies the experience of both Ukrainian and foreign colleagues who grow hazelnuts. For the most up-to-date information on growing hazelnuts - correspond with the famous American pro Dr. Shawn Mehlenbacher (Dr. Shawn Mehlenbacher), professor of selection and genetics of hazelnuts at the Department of Horticulture of Oregon State University (Oregon State University).

Serhiy annually analyzes the obtained results of growing varieties of different selection.

At the end of the visit to the nursery, I asked Sergey why he called his garden "VikaSad" (before that I already knew that the name of the garden was named after Sergey's daughter - Victoria), and immediately "ViktoriaSad", which would be very consonant with the name my daughter and with Victory. But Serhiy answered sensibly: "My daughter is still young, and there is still work to be done before my victory in the garden. Maybe by the time she grows up, I will have enough knowledge and experience, and then we will change the name to "ViktoriaSad".

Therefore, after inspecting the nursery, we immediately moved on to the purpose of our visit.

In Ukraine, there are amateur hazelnut growers, including Serhiy Kuchugurny, who study almost the entire world selection of hazelnuts on their plots, adding new varieties to their collection every year. These collections of hazelnuts can practically become the centers of their primary varietal testing and varietal study. At the level of local amateur breeders, breeding works on the selection of new promising forms, together with breeding works on hybridization with varieties of different selection, have become widespread in the recent period.

In turn, the dominant crop in planted nut orchards in the last 3-4 years is hazelnut. Industrial hazelnut farming in Ukraine is a new direction, the mass start of industrial hazelnut gardens began in 2014-2016, and now it is rapidly gaining momentum.

So far, 11 hazelnut varieties of American selection have been registered in Ukraine and entered into the State Register of plant varieties suitable for distribution in Ukraine.

Therefore, we need professional comparative characteristics of hazelnut varieties of Ukrainian and foreign selection in order to select the most promising hazelnut varieties for industrial cultivation in Ukraine.

For this purpose, the Ukrainian Nut Association initiated the creation of a joint working group, which, on the one hand, included specialists from leading scientific institutions: the Institute of Horticulture of the National Academy of Sciences (Kyiv), the Ukrainian Research Institute of Forestry and Agroforestry named after H. M. Vysotskyi (Kharkiv), Odesa State Agrarian University (Odesa), on the other hand, specialists of the National Dendrological Park "SOFIIVKA" of the National Academy of Sciences of Ukraine (Uman), Research and Selection Dendrological Center "Veseli Bokovenki" (Kirovohrad Region) , who grow and store the largest collection of Ukrainian hazelnut varieties, and on the other hand, the best amateur hazelnut growers of the country for joint cooperation.

On the basis of obtaining results from different climatic zones of Ukraine, statistical processing of comparative characteristics of hazelnut varieties, studies of the main economic characteristics, qualitative and quantitative composition of fats, proteins, carbohydrates, vitamins, and mineral composition of varieties of Ukrainian and foreign selection will be carried out. As a result of the research, appropriate classification of varieties will be carried out according to their target groups (with a high fat content, high protein, according to the size of the fruit, and others).

All these studies will be used in the design of future industrial hazelnut orchards to create an industrial culture of growing hazelnuts as a crop of high profitability.

... Leaving the hospitable hosts - the father and son of the Kuchugurns, I thought to myself that there is an Atlantis in Ukraine, and not only in this city - everywhere. Because real ATLANTIS live and work in it - professional AMATEUR GARDENERS!

President of the Ukrainian Nut Association G. Yudin