Countdown to Fall – Aw, Nuts

On my property are two black walnut trees.  They’ve been there since before I was born and are now about 3 feet in diameter.  From them, many nuts have dropped through the years and between Mother Nature’s planting and squirrels forgetting where they left them, about two dozen trees have arisen in various locations.  By the way, if anyone would like some really good lumber or firewood (black walnut is excellent wood for either purpose) and actually knows what they’re doing, come get ‘em.

If you’re not familiar with black walnuts, once hulled and cracked (more on that in a minute) they are similar in appearance to regular walnuts.  Their taste is much stronger, though, sort of the walnut family equivalent of espresso coffee.  Some like them, some don’t.  I like them in small amounts.

To get to the nutmeat is a two-step process.  First, you have to break through the soft thick green hull outside.  That’s the easy part, and the pulp stains everything a yellowish-green that dries to brown.  It makes a great dye that’s been used for centuries, but it’s not all that nice looking on the hands over the following 1-3 days.  Once the outer hull is removed, there is a hard shell surrounding the nutmeat.  You know that neat little triangular shaped nut cracker that comes in holiday gift sets and works really well on regular walnuts?  Well, forget it.  Even before the nuts dry and cure for about 4 weeks (yes, really), cracking the inner hull requires industrial strength methods, although perhaps not all that sophisticated.  There are tools available which nicely split the hull and leave the nut halves intact, but I’m into the old adage of, “When all else fails, hit it with a hammer.”  You may get smaller pieces, but they’re still edible, and you get to take your frustrations out on a poor little well-armored nut.

Needless to say, with two dozen (and counting) trees on the property, the squirrels are busy.  But they don’t generally harvest them off the trees.  They wait for them to drop, then chew the soft hull off and scurry off with their bounty.  Now, consider this – each green-hulled black walnut is about the size of a tennis ball and it’s solid.  There’s a whole physics and math thing going on here involving mass and velocity which my brain has never done, but trust me – when these things fall from even 10 feet above, they land loud and hard.  You know when you’ve been hit by one (yes, I have), and if your car is parked under them, there will be little craters left in metal, although car windshields tend to survive the impact with only a stain of green smoosh left behind.

I gather, hull and store a few dozen nuts for use around the holidays and I do highly recommend trying them if you get the opportunity.  However, I'd try to avoid remaining under the trees for long amounts of time during September.  This year isn’t a bumper crop due to the lack of rain, but there’s still enough lurking in the branches above to be wary of.  The trees are also losing their leaves at the same time (last to get them in the spring, first to lose them in the fall), and many times there are still nuts on the trees even after most of the leaves are gone, and you get to see where each little round weapon of minor destruction is waiting just for you.  Be careful.

Only 12 days until Fall.