what do you know about walnuts?

[countryborn]

not just eating walnuts, but harvesting them, hulling, drying, etc.  and next spring, we will spray, or something, to minimize damage from pests & disease.  and prune, of course.
we have 3 huge old walnut trees (more than 60 years old) on the property where we are building.  they haven't been taken care of for many years.  right now, lots of nuts on the tree, some on the ground.  (critters harvest most of the ground fall nuts, probably)
a lot of the nut hulls, are black or turning black.  does that mean the nuts are probably bad?
we picked up a big box full yesterday, after shaking the trees a little.  lots left on & under the trees.   I guess we should remove the hulls before drying.  in our spare time.   then dry the nuts.
any idea on how to dry many many walnuts?  the weather has turned cool, & if we leave them lying around outside to dry, we will have to post an armed guard to discourage the squirrels & jays & crows.
We are in wetern Oregon, Willamette Valley.
any ideas or links much appreciated.

[peternap]

Walnut are a diabetics best friend on the trail.

Let the outer hulls turn black and dry then you can get to the inner hull.
There have been more crackers invented than you can count. They're a PITA to crack and pick.

The hulls will stain your skin and everything else they touch. When I wa a kid, you alway knew when the farmers were harvesting walnuts because the kids would come to school with brown hands and arms.

Boil them to make a nice dye. I boil traps in them to rust proof them.

Prune like any other nut tree. Just get the crossing and dead branches. Check for insect damage and rot.

[rwanders]

My grandparents used to put them in a big wooden box with a lid and small roof over it out in the back yard--sort of like an old fashioned well house. The box had a lot of small holes drilled for ventilation so they would dry out. They are a bear to crack----much harder than commercial "english walnuts". Essentially a lot of work for small return.

[sparks]

Mom used to press walnuts into some sort of sugar patty .....Christmas candy...

Homemade stuff...and yummie

Sure miss it....

That's about all I know 'bout walnuts



sparks

[MountainDon]

Maple sugar candy, with or without the walnuts. Also good with other nuts. 

[peternap]

Maple sugar candy, with or without the walnuts. Also good with other nuts. 

You sugar people just make me sick

[MountainDon]

Ooops. Sorry about that Peter.   

[considerations]

This is about English walnuts.  I don't know about the black walnuts.
If they fall off the tree then its time to shake the limbs to get more (you did good)
The hulls are easier to take off when the hull is still green. But just 'cause the hulls are black doesn't mean the nuts are no good.
Open a couple, they are ripe if the tissue closest to the shell is a layer darker than the rest of the nut.
Wear gloves to avoid staining your hands
Use a jet of pressured water to finish rinsing the nut shells.
Check for cracked or slightly open shells, those probably are not good.
Find a way to let them dry for a few weeks, like in a rack or a cage made of hardware cloth to keep critters out, or somewhere in your house where the air is not moist.   (Willamette valley in October?  Drying inside the house is probably a better idea)
To test to see if they are dry enough, crack a few and see if they crack open along the seams like the ones you buy in the store.  That's when they are dry enough to store.
If so, then bagging them in plastic or storing in an airtight container will keep them fresher than just stored in a box.
Keeping them in a freezer will prolong freshness as well.

Hope this helps.

[countryborn]

Thanks!  good information.
a few more questions - should the nuts be spread out in a single layer to dry?  can we dry them in the oven, at about 200 degrees, spread out on a cookie sheet?  (probably won't do that, too many nuts.)
now, we have several legs of old pantyhose filled with walnuts & hung up to dry on the wall behind the woodstove.  (How's that for autumn decoration?)     That is probably the driest part of the house, but not too hot.  think that will work for the drying?
In the future, we were thinking of planting apple trees near the walnut trees, but don't know if they would be compatible.  These are English walnuts, as far as I know.  We have lots of "volunteer" trees on out hill, especially alder & maple, but I don't see any near the walnut trees, even well away from their dripline.

[considerations]

I like the wood stove option, but I'd keep an eye on them.  You can get them too dry...or melt the stockings onto them, ick.  Did that to my leg once, when my bike tipped over on me.  Its messy.    I don't know about drying them in the oven, so I can't answer that question. 

My walnut tree is in line with the apple trees.....but I'm keeping all of them pruned to a height that I can pick without a ladder.  You are right, not much likes to grown under a walnut tree, but its the tannin in the leaves that causes that. 

I wouldn't mulch the apple trees with walnut leaves, and left alone, a walnut will get much taller and spread a lot more than an apple tree.  So I would take its potential size and the shadow it can cast into consideration, but other than those issues, they can be "near" each other.

Walnut leaf mulch is a great weed deterrent if you have spots you want to get under control.

[Don_P]

Not sure about the English variety, black walnuts produce juglanone (sp?) a natural herbicide that kills many things that might try to grow under it. The horse folks shy away from the dust so I clean up well after sawing or planing it and use the shavings on our forest paths.

The stain is pretty heavy duty. We didn't think to warn a friend who was helping us one time, turned her hands black and it takes awhile to wear off. She's a nurse, I'll bet there was some explaining to the patients  .

I rounded the curve into our local deer stretch one afternoon, I always putt through there, the varmints will run into your door if you're not careful, anyway, there was a party going on under the walnut tree. The cars had been cracking fallen nuts, the crows and squirrels hightailed it and the whitetail did the prettiest pirouette I've ever seen before bounding into the brush. Kept us laughing the rest of the way home.