Walnut Trees

[shaded]

hey
black walnuts are wonderful if you get the tree

I have one that I put the compost under it so it's perfect because I don't expect anything to grow under it, except in the actual compost up to this year I got one! one of the babies sprouted under mama so I have another walnut to plant somewhere else.

so no for around livestock, but great for compost and tree growth. I want real English Walnuts though, not the black bitter itty-bitty things that come from this tree lol (though they taste great and awesome for icecream making)

[Bayvistafarm]

The walnut trees and butternuts grow so fast around here!! much faster than any maple tree. The 'baby' down by the mom tree had walnuts on it in 10 years.

Yes, we collect them. Tractor buckets full... and then dump them back in the bush. I can't believe the size of the ones growing in my garden. Before I even realize another one has grown... its 7 feet tall!

The are delicious tho... butternuts too. We put them in the vice... and then use the nut pickers to get the meat out. We put them in a five gallon bucket with water. Keep changing it every few days. When the outsides get soft/rotten... if you have a powerful pressure washer, run that in the bucket and swish the nuts around. Takes no time to clean them off. Or you can drive over them, if your tractor/car isn't too heavy. pressure washer cleans them right off.

[WLLady]

we harvested and ate ours one year (the year i discovered that i should stay away from walnuts just like peanuts....LOL)....we collected a wheelbarrow full off the ground with the husks kinda starting to crack etc. then drove over them with the truck (after dumping the wheelbarrow on the driveway lol). that got the coatings off. then left them in mesh bags in the basement to dry for a bit. then when i was bored one winter day i took them out to the shop, triple bagged them and went to town on them with the sledgehammer LOL. fun, effective. then dumped them out on the counter and picked the meat pieces out. they were very very yummy-but i only got a little ways into them before i had hives and discovered nuts are not really for me. LOL. hubby liked them, and i used some in some cookies....no clue how they were because i didn't eat them again in the cookies, but the cookies all were eaten....so. i just hate the mess of the nuts on the ground. if you hit the green ones with the 5 foot mower behind the tractor they become very dangerous projectiles that go at least 50 feet in the air.....

[baronrenfrew]

WLLady, you're a good one to answer this (anyone else please add as well). Peanuts aren't really nuts as nuts come from a tree. And an issue with peanuts is that farmers grow the same crop on the same land year after year causing fungus/mold/disease/pest problems then a large amount of chemicals needed to combat these problems. I understood our allergies to be a reaction to these chemical residues more than the nut itself. Am I on the right track?
I know I have a reaction to 1.almonds 2. Hazelnuts that are bagged for sale (numbness in lips) but if chopped and cooked or processed differently no problem. Sometimes apples and cherries (from a grocery store) bother me the same way but never a problem fresh from a tree. I know apples put in storage are sprayed with a fungicide and it is my belief that my reaction is to the fungicide (i've never been tested). The fungicide is not required on a label and this may be sprayed or washed onto other fruits/veg/nuts as well. This suspicion confirmed as I have no issue with peeled almonds but a problem if the red skin is still on. Agree/disagree/comment?

[baronrenfrew]

Fyi a three year membership to the Society of Ontario Nut Growers is $45 and comes with the book "Nut Growing Ontario Style" and its a fantastic manual for growing / processing/ storing nuts. Nuts that aren't processed properly at harvest could harbour pathogens that make people sick similiar to allergic reactions.

[WLLady]

i think everyone is a little bit different....for me it's the oils in the nuts. someone cooks with peanut oil and i breath it in i'm just a bad off as if i had eaten peanuts, i've had peanuts grown in an organic home garden and still allergic (even though they tasted completely different-both raw and baked), so doubt its a pesticide issue for me. And yes, peanuts are actually a legume, and probably not surprisingly i also get hives with chickpeas...very related legume. LOL. but ONLY if i eat a lot of them! What i would love to try (but i'm too big a wuss) is to grow peanuts and see if i'm allergic to the actual plant....now THAT would be neat....LOL.

if i handle a walnut with the casing, i'll get brown fingers (as would anyone not wearing gloves), but no problems. if i handle the hard woodlike part of the nut i'm okay. if i get into the actual meat of the nut, where the oil is, i get hives like mad and if i eat them i end up sick and hives and itchy and tingling and numbness down my throat but so far no anaphylaxis (cutting off of oxygen) to tree nuts, but anaphylaxis to peanuts. but i have no doubt that everyone is different and eating pesticides etc isn't really the best thing for anyone! i did get tested, very thoroughly by a very good allergist, to both the meat and the oils of the tree nuts and peanuts and shellfish. apparently the peanut allergy runs with a shellfish allergy because of the structure of the molecules being similar in one of the proteins, and yes, i am also unable to eat clams and oysters for the same reason.... i can only speak really to my own issue(s)....oh, if you are allergic to shellfish, be careful with oyster shell as a calcium source for your chickens and with taking chondroitin/glucosamine-a lot of the arthritis supplements are extracted from shellfish (found out the hard way)....

but i can eat chestnuts and almonds (in moderation)....so.....??? hm.

and i don't recommend being clocked by a walnut shot from under a mower. better than anaphylaxis....but still. Any new trees around my place will be fruit trees.

[baronrenfrew]

Lol, how's this: an alpricot. An apricot fruit and the stone inside is very close to an almond! It was all the rage ten years ago but all nurseries in Niagara were put on lockdown for some disease this fruit had picked up (not contagious to other fruit) and so the folks that have them are not allowed to propogate/move/sell them.
In some hot tropical countries the alpricot is the only way they can grow almonds as its too hot for regular almonds.
This from grimonut.com "Why can’t you sell Almond or Alpricot anymore?
Almond and apricot (‘alpricot’ is a name we coined to identify apricot cultivars that have sweet seeds) are members of the prunus family that are affected by a European virus called ‘Sharka’ or more commonly known as ‘plum pox’. This disease was found in peach orchards in the Niagara area. To prevent the spread of this virus, the whole region was quarantined. This means that we cannot send trees or seed of these species out of the quarantine area."

[windwalkingwolf]

QR_BBPOST WLLady, you're a good one to answer this (anyone else please add as well). Peanuts aren't really nuts as nuts come from a tree. And an issue with peanuts is that farmers grow the same crop on the same land year after year causing fungus/mold/disease/pest problems then a large amount of chemicals needed to combat these problems. I understood our allergies to be a reaction to these chemical residues more than the nut itself. Am I on the right track?
I know I have a reaction to 1.almonds 2. Hazelnuts that are bagged for sale (numbness in lips) but if chopped and cooked or processed differently no problem. Sometimes apples and cherries (from a grocery store) bother me the same way but never a problem fresh from a tree. I know apples put in storage are sprayed with a fungicide and it is my belief that my reaction is to the fungicide (i've never been tested). The fungicide is not required on a label and this may be sprayed or washed onto other fruits/veg/nuts as well. This suspicion confirmed as I have no issue with peeled almonds but a problem if the red skin is still on. Agree/disagree/comment?

I cannot eat raw hazelnuts, though roasted aren't too bad in moderation, e.g. the amount you'd get in a chocolate bar. Raw hazelnuts make my throat swell shut, roasted just irritate my throat a little if I overdo it...scratchy for several days as if I have a cold. I also cannot eat raw hickory nuts picked off my land that has not seen pesticicides in at least 40 years, but roasted is ok, same issues as with hazelnuts. SO generally I avoid hazels and hickories.
Peanuts I have zero problems with, indeed I eat peanut butter wholesale, but I don't know about the raw "legume". Never had raw peanuts, and wouldn't want to. Don't know about chestnuts, since I haven't had them since I was a kid, but back then I was able to eat them ok. Walnuts, Pecans, Brazils, Almonds, Cashews, and Pistachios I'm all fine with. But again, I always eat roasted, cooked or otherwise processed, and have no idea if I would react at all to the raw nut, but I suspect not. So I'm not sure that pesticides have anything to do with it. at least in my case. But I'd be curious to see some studies done, and also how this would translate into other allergies like bee stings, for example, would an allergic person be as allergic to a bee kept in an organic bio-dome as opposed to a wild bee collecting nectar and pollen from sprayed plants?

[goatgal35]

QR_BBPOST Mine get hit by lightning a lot and they kill the grass and i have to fence off in the fall because leaves and nut shells are poisonous to horses......
If i had my choice and a pile of time they would be gone. They are nice big trees but when they do give nuts do NOT rake under them in the fall in the wind...not until every single one of those headbashers has fallen....

I believe that the leaves are poisonous to everything. I watch my guys (horse, ponies, llamas, goats, cattle, pigs and sheep)eat them every fall once the leaves are on the ground, and my critters are fine. I have been told that black walnut is a natural dewormer and that is why the critters eat a few leaves in the fall. Natures way for controlling internal parasites.

[Maximus]

Josh is peanuts ans tree nuts. If it was a pesticide thing his Anaphyaxis would apply to a whole lot of foods. It's the protien in the peanut and nut.

Josh is like you Kathy, doesn't have to eat it, but a good sniff and we've got trouble. Husking shells at sporting events etc all pose a life threatening situation. He's been in ER many times with his peanut allergy and never because he's eaten it, always by being around the allergen.

If Josh eats too much soy (which is hard to do with me being his mom) he will get hives and feel like he has the stomach flu, same as peas and I suspect would be the same as chick peas but he won't eat them so I don't know. We just avoid all legumes for him.

As far as nuts go, the only one he is OK with is almonds. All the others are under the anaphylaxis category, especially macadamia nuts, his worst as far as nuts go.

When we were looking to buy, before this place, we saw so many homes with nuts trees. One, not far from here had just planted over 200 walnut trees and had obtained farm status. We then narrowed our search by asking for homes without nut trees.

I wonder where acorns fall on the spectrum. They don't pose a problem for Josh, just curious.