DIY "not to do tip" of the day with black walnut nuts for planting

[cavey]

My tip of the day, for those of you that want to try and harvest black walnuts to plant in the spring - just buy seedlings....

I've done seeds from oaks, I have done others as well - and I knew walnuts can stain. I was wearing rubber gloves but they had a tear or two. The nuts were still green with very little darkening and only a few had the maggots in them. So I was not working with dark juice. Just the green and yellow husk and what ever clear juice they had.

Now it looks like I took a trip to the peak of Mt Everest - K2 and came back with frostbite.

Im going to push through with this project as I husked half a wheel barrow full of nuts and its not like staining my hand more will hurt. Just cant wait to see how many weeks it takes for my thumb to look alive again.

 

[Jerry-B-WI]

Do you have to husk them? Or could you wait until the husks dry out?

 

[cavey]

Years ago, I made drying cages for them then just direct planted them with very little luck.

On a whim here yesterday i saw them dropping- and having two BW trees in the back yard I grabbed a wheel barrow half full of them. Looked up on google "how to" and decided to give this a try. I will likely cold stratify them in the fridge overwinter or just direct plant them into the garden next to my white oak acorn bed from two years ago that is full of new oaks. Just wanted to give it a try again. I have heard of people just planting them as they found them. Grab a bucket and a shovel (thats what the squirrels do)

I honestly dont know the best way to do it.

This was just one of those oh crap moments - when i peeled off the gloves I had a nice surprise -- though I would share. Its Just that these guys stain even when they husks are green ... wear better gloves than I did, My hand looks terrible. I took a foot callus scrapper and ground on my thumb for a bit and got back to regular color so Im hoping in a week or so it will be mostly gone. But my thumb looks terrible and me and the wife are going out for dinner this weekend.

as a side note to a side note... those two BW trees have been a pain in my arrrrs as yard trees - never plant them in a yard or near a garden area. They belong on the back 40.

 

[Feelslikefar.]

Last year I made that same mistake, without gloves. I looked odd for a few days.

I think I planted some in pots, then when I was done I thought to myself... "I don't think that's how this works." Then I stated to remember what you're supposed to do with the nuts. lol
In the end, like my acorns, none of them were viable in the spring so it was all a wast of time.

 

[Jerry-B-WI]

I made some Nocino, Nocello one year. It's a type of Italian liquor. You pick the walnuts in early June, while they're still soft, quarter them and soak them in Everclear. I wore double nitrite gloves and laid newspaper down where I did the cutting. Luckily avoided the staining you have.

 

[OakSeeds]

Here's a simple solution that works well for me. Put your green walnuts in a gunny/feed sack and smash them with a concrete block (use as a hammer, don't drop from garage roof). Make a metal basket out of hardware cloth (half inch or bigger (3 ft long, 2 ft wide and 8 inches deep).
Now, power wash them in the basket and watch the hulls fly off (no soap please). It's even easier if you wait until they begin to get darker,black. You can still wear gloves.

 

[cavey]

Here's a simple solution that works well for me. Put your green walnuts in a gunny/feed sack and smash them with a concrete block (use as a hammer, don't drop from garage roof). Make a metal basket out of hardware cloth (half inch or bigger (3 ft long, 2 ft wide and 8 inches deep).
Now, power wash them in the basket and watch the hulls fly off (no soap please). It's even easier if you wait until they begin to get darker,black. You can still wear gloves.

I saw a video of a guy taking whole nuts husks and all - dumping them into a bucket and filling with water - electric power drill and a plaster mixer and just blend away, goes slow at first then the husks just shred off leaving the nuts.

Its crazy how strong the nuts are.... I seen vids of people driving over them with their cars.

If i had, had better gloves this would not have been an issue. - I am sure there are better ways especially with a lot of nuts.

I'm only going to do half a wheel barrows worth of nuts. I'm going to put the shelled nuts in a 5 gal buck and do the paint mixer on them then rinse - float test them and bag em. From there I will decide my next move.

For the number of nuts I did, I just pulled up a chair next to the wheelbarrow and took a knife and scored all the way around the husk cutting down to the nut, gave a twist and then made a half cut on the half that didnt spin off, twisted the blade and popped the nut out. It all went relatively fast.

As I worked on them, I could slowly see the nuts turning black as they oxidized - that should have been my first clue, I was almost done when I started to feel juice in the glove that should have been my 2nd clue.

 

[cavey]

Here's a simple solution that works well for me. Put your green walnuts in a gunny/feed sack and smash them with a concrete block (use as a hammer, don't drop from garage roof). Make a metal basket out of hardware cloth (half inch or bigger (3 ft long, 2 ft wide and 8 inches deep).
Now, power wash them in the basket and watch the hulls fly off (no soap please). It's even easier if you wait until they begin to get darker,black. You can still wear gloves.

I made a wire cloth cage for drying them out - it was close to 4x8 and worked like a suit case - that would have worked had I still had the thing.

 

[Grimby]

My tip of the day, for those of you that want to try and harvest black walnuts to plant in the spring - just buy seedlings....

I've done seeds from oaks, I have done others as well - and I knew walnuts can stain. I was wearing rubber gloves but they had a tear or two. The nuts were still green with very little darkening and only a few had the maggots in them. So I was not working with dark juice. Just the green and yellow husk and what ever clear juice they had.

Now it looks like I took a trip to the peak of Mt Everest - K2 and came back with frostbite.

Im going to push through with this project as I husked half a wheel barrow full of nuts and its not like staining my hand more will hurt. Just cant wait to see how many weeks it takes for my thumb to look alive again.

I have planted thousands of walnuts with the husks on this time of year. Fill a 5 gallon bucket with walnuts,about 75-100(husk on) walk around property drop on ground and stomp on the nut with your heel to cover with dirt. I have had excellent results through the years with this planting technique and have trees from seedlings to 40ft.
Good luck

 

[Grimby]

Years ago, I made drying cages for them then just direct planted them with very little luck.

On a whim here yesterday i saw them dropping- and having two BW trees in the back yard I grabbed a wheel barrow half full of them. Looked up on google "how to" and decided to give this a try. I will likely cold stratify them in the fridge overwinter or just direct plant them into the garden next to my white oak acorn bed from two years ago that is full of new oaks. Just wanted to give it a try again. I have heard of people just planting them as they found them. Grab a bucket and a shovel (thats what the squirrels do)

I honestly dont know the best way to do it.

This was just one of those oh crap moments - when i peeled off the gloves I had a nice surprise -- though I would share. Its Just that these guys stain even when they husks are green ... wear better gloves than I did, My hand looks terrible. I took a foot callus scrapper and ground on my thumb for a bit and got back to regular color so Im hoping in a week or so it will be mostly gone. But my thumb looks terrible and me and the wife are going out for dinner this weekend.

as a side note to a side note... those two BW trees have been a pain in my arrrrs as yard trees - never plant them in a yard or near a garden area. They belong on the back 40.

Drying nut will lessen viability.Direct seed in autumn is best.