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Controlling Insects and Diseases
Good cultural and sanitation practices will help reduce losses from some insects and diseases. Keep trees growing with moderate vigor. In the fall or early spring, rake up and burn or haul away old leaves, hulls, unharvested nuts, and dead twigs. During the growing season, pick up and burn or haul away any nuts that fall prematurely--they usually have worms in them.
Pruning
Pruning young trees (except filberts)
Pruning young trees helps them develop a desirable shape and branch structure. As nut trees become larger, pruning is usually limited to removing dead or damaged branches. With a minimal amount of pruning, nut trees usually develop a strong and attractive structure if they have adequate space.
Following heavy cutting-back at planting, several shoots may compete for the position of the new leader or main trunk. When the new shoots are 8 to 12 inches long, select the strongest and straightest 1 for the leader and pinch out the growing tips of the competing ones. In late winter or early spring each year, shorten the lower branches. If any of the lower branches grow vigorously during the growing season, pinch out the growing point. As the tree grows taller, the lower branches can be cut off flush with the trunk; remove a few of these lower branches each year.
Leaving the lower branches on the young tree aids its overall growth by increasing its food-manufacturing ability and providing shade for the trunk during the growing season. Limiting the growth of the lower branches by cutting back and pinching out the tips of vigorous shoots keeps them small and reduces the size of the pruning wound when they are removed later.
Eventually all branches arising from the trunk within 6 to 8 feet of the ground should be removed. This facilitates mowing and other cultural practices.
The pruning practices described here for transplanted trees are also suggested for trees started from seed and for varieties grafted onto seedling trees.
Pruning filberts
Filberts, which are large multi-stemmed shrubs, should be pruned like lilacs, mock orange, and other large shrubs. Thin out the smaller and weaker shoots each spring, cutting them off at ground level. Remove any damaged, diseased, or weak older stems, cutting them off near the ground level. A shrub with 5 to 7 main stems is suggested. Winkler is usually more bush-like than the hybrid filberts.
Harvesting and Handling Black Walnuts
Light-colored black walnut kernels have a milder flavor than dark ones. If you prefer light-colored kernels, hull the nuts as soon as they drop from the tree. Allowing the hulls to partially decompose before hulling causes a discoloration of the kernels.
The hulls are thick and fleshy at maturity. They can be mashed and removed by hand, but mechanical devices such as a corn sheller make the job easier.
After hulling, wash the nuts thoroughly and spread out away from sunlight to dry for 2 to 3 weeks. Then store in a cool, dry place.
Kernels that have been tempered before the shell is cracked are easier to remove. Soak the nuts in water for 1 to 2 hours, drain, then keep in a closed container for 10 to 12 hours. The kernels will absorb enough moisture to become tough, yet will remain loose in the shell.
Harvesting and Handling Hickory nuts
Hickory nuts are edible, but take considerable effort to produce significant quantities. Shells should readily fall off when the kernels are ready. Crack nuts open and extract the kernel inside. To grow a hickory, remove husks and store nuts in plastic bags at about 41 degrees for 3 months, or plant them right away and heavily mulch the soil. Plant 3/4 to 1 1/2 inches deep.
Harvesting and Handling Walnuts
Walnuts should be harvested as they fall from the tree. Hull right away for light-colored kernels, which have a milder flavor than darker kernels caused by allowing the hull to remain on and decompose. The thick, fleshy hulls can be removed by hand or mechanical devices such as corn shellers make it easier. After hulling, wash thoroughly and spread them out away from sunlight for 2 to 3 weeks of drying. Store in a cool, dry place.
Cracking walnuts to get the kernels can be made easier by soaking in water for 1 to 2 hours, draining, and storing in a closed container for 10 to 12 hours. The kernel will absorb enough moisture to become tough yet will remain loose in the shell.
Harvesting and Handling Horse Chestnuts
Horse chestnuts, members of the buckeye family, can be poisonous to livestock and potentially humans. Avoid eating or chewing on them. Often mistaken for chestnuts, the leaves of horse chestnut have 7 to 9 wedge-shaped leaflets arranged like spokes of a wheel. The nuts have thorny husks covering them. By comparison, chestnuts have large single leaves and husks that are very spiny. Chestnut blight has wiped out the chestnut tree, but resistant varieties may allow this tree to someday be common again.
Harvesting Pecans
Pecans are harvested very much like walnuts, except they generally are not bothered by the walnut husk fly. When pecans start dropping, it's time to harvest.
General information about harvesting nuts
All of the nuts, except for chestnuts have a hard shell that will break or shatter under pressure. Roller crackers adapted from grain mills may be the best way for the small processor to handle the cracking process. It is important to size the nuts first, especially for hazelnuts, otherwise kernels will be split on larger nuts and smaller nuts will go right through uncracked. Once the nuts are sized through screens, all of one size can be cracked at once. Before cracking, make sure the nuts are quite dry. They should be below 10% moisture level. If they have been properly dried in a dryer and have been stored in a dry location, then the nuts should be ready for cracking.. This type of cracker works best for hazelnuts, Persian walnuts and black walnuts.
Further refinements will be needed to crack heartnuts. Heartnuts need to be precisely sized and then fed in a single stream on edge into slightly curved cracking rollers. Heartnuts crack best when the edges are struck. Then they open like a locket, releasing the kernel in one or two pieces.
Aspirators (similar to dust collectors) and blowers can be used to separate the nut meats from the shell. An easy home made blower can be made from a furnace blower. By pouring the nuts and shell mixture into the stream of air, the shell being heavier will blow away, while the heavier nut meats will fall straight down into a bin. This action may need to be repeated two or three times to remove the majority of the shell. This works well with hazelnuts, Persian walnuts and to a lesser degree with heart nuts.
When the nuts are fed into the updraft of air in an aspirator, the compact nut meats fall, while the lighter shell fragments go up in the air stream. The amount of separation can be very finely tuned by dampening the amount of lift.
A final hand sort is necessary in both systems, to remove all shell fragments and spoiled nut meats. The meats then can be bagged and sealed with your own attractive label.
Preserving Nuts
Most nuts will have good quality for up to a year. Before summer arrives, it is a good idea to store surplus nuts in a cooler or a freezer. The fresh taste will be maintained. For those of you trying to sell nuts, remember if the crop is larger than you would be able to retail, then it would be wise to either wholesale the crop or develop value added products from your nuts.
Nut shells continue to develop, making one think there is a crop on the tree. When nuts start falling and the owner starts picking them up, he discovers the empty nuts.
Some of my favorite nut recipes.
Walnut Butter:
1/2 cup walnut pieces
4 ounces (1 stick) unsalted butter, cut into pieces, at room temperature
1 tablespoon minced shallots
1 teaspoon chopped garlic
1/2 teaspoon salt
Preheat the oven to 400 degrees F.
Spread the walnuts on a baking sheet and lightly toast in the oven for 7 to 10 minutes. Remove from the oven and let cool. Roughly chop.
Place the butter, walnuts, shallots, garlic, and salt in a medium bowl, and mix well with a rubber spatula. Spoon down the middle of an 8-inch piece of parchment paper and roll into a log, about 1-inch in diameter. Wrap tightly and refrigerate until ready to use.
Hickory Nut Cake
4 eggs
2 cups of sugar
1 cup of milk
one-half cup of butter
3 cups of flour
2 cups of Hickory nuts
2 teaspoons of baking powder
lemon or almond flavoring
Beat sugar and butter to cream, then add eggs, well beaten; add milk; mix baking powder and flour and add; beat well, then add nuts sprinkled with flour. Cook in moderate oven.
Almond Balls
2 cups of sugar
3/4 cup of cold water
1/2 pound of blanched almonds *
drops of vanilla or bitter almonds (to taste)
Boil sugar and cold water until it thickens. Set away to cool for half and hour, and then add a half pound of blanched almonds broken into small pieces, and a few drops of either vanilla or bitter almonds, according to taste. Stir with a wooden spoon until it creams; place on a marble slab or a large dish and knead a few minutes as you would bread; then mold into balls with your hands.
• To Blanch almonds: shell them, immerse in boiling water and let stand five minutes; then dip in cold water and the skins can be easily removed.
There are so many ways to use nuts in cooking. We put pistachios or pinenuts in our salads. Slivered almonds on our fresh string beans. Cashews in our stir fries. Walnuts in our brownies. Macadamia nuts in our home made ice cream. Coconut in our home made sherbet and sorbet. We could go on and on and we are sure you have your own favorite recipes using nuts..
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Author Bio Box: Arlene Wright Correll
 Resources: Excerpted from “Food For Thought Series” by Arlene Wright-Correll
For more gardening or cooking information click http://www.learn-america.com/ and click on Arlene’s Books you can download or buy my gardening & cook books. All my royalties from the sale of my books go to the St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital and we thank you for your attention to this site.
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