ENGLISH WALNUTS
WHAT YOU NEED TO KNOW ABOUT PLANTING,
CULTIVATING AND HARVESTING THIS MOST DELICIOUS OF NUTS
(Compiled by Walter Fox
Allen)
(Copyright 1912)
Foreword.
Realizing the tremendous interest that is now being directed by owners
of country estates everywhere to the culture of the Persian or English
Walnut, I have compiled this little book with the idea of supplying the
instruction needed on the planting, cultivation and harvesting of this
most delicious of all nuts.
I have gathered the material herein presented from a large number of
trustworthy sources, using only such portions of each as would seem to be
of prime importance to the intending grower.
I am indebted to the United States Department of Agriculture and to
numerous cultivators of the nut in all sections of the country.
I have aimed at accuracy and brevity—and hope the following pages will
furnish just that practical information which I have felt has long been
desired.
The Compiler.
[5]
English Walnuts.
Viewed as a comparatively new industry, the culture of the Persian or
English Walnut is making remarkable strides in this country. Owners of
farms and suburban estates everywhere are becoming interested in the
raising of this delicious article of food, thousands of trees being set
out every year.
There are two important reasons for the rapidly growing enthusiasm that
is being manifested toward the English Walnut: First, its exceptional
value as a food property is becoming widely recognized, one pound of
walnut meat being equal in nutriment to eight pounds of steak. Secondly,
its superior worth[6] as an ornamental
shade tree is admitted by everyone who knows the first thing about trees.
For this purpose there is nothing more beautiful. With their
wide-spreading branches and dark-green foliage, they are a delight to the
eye. Unlike the leaves of some of our shade trees, those of this variety
do not drop during the Summer but adhere until late in the Fall, thus
making an unusually clean tree for lawn or garden. In addition to all
this, the walnut is particularly free from scale and other pests.
Up to the present time, the English Walnut has been more largely in
demand as a shade tree than as a commercial proposition; in fact, so
little attention has been given to the nuts themselves that there are,
comparatively speaking, few large producing orchards in the United States,
the greater portion of the total yield of walnuts being procured from
scattered field and roadside trees. It is a little difficult to understand
why they should have been so neglected when there are records of single
trees [7] bearing as much as 800 pounds of nuts in one
year.
Six Year Old Bearing English
Walnut Tree
In 1895 this country produced about 4,000,000 pounds, and more than
16,000,000 pounds of English Walnuts in 1907, with a proportionate annual
increase each year to the present. But, when it is known that the United
States is consuming yearly about 50,000,000 pounds of nuts, with the
demand constantly increasing, thereby necessitating the importation
annually of something more than 25,000,000 pounds, the wonderful
possibilities of the industry in this country, from a purely business view
point, will readily be appreciated. And of course the market price of the
walnut is keeping step with the consumption, having advanced from 15 to 20
cents a pound in the past few years.
A Rival of the Orange
In California the nut industry is becoming a formidable rival of the
orange; in fact, there are more dollars worth of nuts (all varieties)
shipped from the state now per[8] year than
oranges. One grower is shipping $136,000 worth of English Walnuts a year
while another man, with an orchard just beginning to bear, is getting
about $200 an acre for his crop.
No standard estimate can at present be placed on the yield per acre of
orchards in full bearing, but the growers are confident that they will
soon be deriving from $800 to $1600 per acre, this figure being based on
the number of individual trees which are already producing from $90 to
$120 a year. The success with the nut in California can be duplicated in
the East providing certain hardy varieties are planted; and in the few
instances where orchards have been started in the East, great things have
already been done and still greater are expected in the next few
years.
Origin of the English Walnut
But where did this walnut originate? What is its history? Juglans Regia
(nut of the gods) Persian Walnut, called also Madeira Nut and English
Walnut, is a native of Western, Central and probably[9] Eastern
Asia, the home of the peach and the apricot. It was known to the Greeks,
who introduced it from Persia into Europe at an early day, as "Persicon"
or "Persian" nut and "Basilicon" or "Royal" nut. Carried from Greece to
Rome, it became "Juglans" (name derived from Jovis and glans, an acorn;
literally "Jupiter's Acorn", or "the Nut of the Gods"). From Rome it was
distributed throughout Continental Europe, and according to Loudon, it
reached England prior to 1562. In England it is generally known as the
walnut, a term of Anglo-Saxon derivation signifying "foreign nut". It has
been called Madeira Nut, presumably because the fruit was formerly
imported into England from the Madeira Islands, where it is yet grown to
some extent. In America it has commonly been known as English Walnut to
distinguish it from our native species. From the fact that of all the
names applied to this nut "Persian" seems to have been the first in common
use, and that it indicates approximately the home of the species, the name
"Persian Walnut" is regarded as most[10] suitable, but
inasmuch as "English Walnut" is better known here, we shall use that name
in this treatise.
As a material for the manufacture of gunstocks and furniture the timber
of the nut was long in great demand throughout Europe and high prices were
paid for it. Early in the last century as much as $3,000 was paid for a
single large tree for the making of gunstocks.
Planting and Cultivation
Everything depends upon the planting and cultivation of English Walnuts
as indeed it does of all other fruits from which the very best results are
desired. The following general rules should be thoroughly
mastered.
Plant English Walnut Trees:
On any well-drained land where the sub-soil moisture is not
more than ten or twelve feet from the surface.
Wherever Oaks, Black Walnuts or other tap-root nut trees
will grow.
Forty to sixty feet apart. [11]
In holes eighteen inches in diameter and thirty inches
deep.
Two inches deeper than the earth mark showing on the
tree.
And Remember:
That the trees need plenty of good, rich soil about their
roots.
That the trees should be inclined slightly toward prevailing
winds.
That the trees should not be cut back.
That the ground cannot be packed too hard around the roots
and the tree.
That the trees should be mulched in the Fall.
That the ground should be kept cultivated around the trees
during the Spring and Summer.
That English Walnut trees should be transplanted while
young, as they will often double in size the year the tap-root reaches the
sub-soil moisture (that is, the moist earth).
[12]That tap-root
trees are the easiest of all to transplant if the work is done while the
trees are young and small.
That trees sometimes bear the third year after transplanting
three-year-old trees where the sub-soil moisture is within six or eight
feet of the surface.
That the age of bearing depends largely on the distance the
tap-root has to grow to reach the sub-soil moisture.
Peculiarities of Growth
The growth of the English Walnut is different from that of most fruit
trees. The small trees grow about six inches the first year, tap-root the
same; the second year they grow about twelve inches, tap-root the same;
the third year they grow about eighteen inches, tap-root nearly as much.
For the first three years the tap-root seems to gain most of the
nourishment, and at the end of the third year, or about that time, the
tree itself starts its real growth. After the tap-root reaches[13] the sub-soil moisture, the tree often grows
as much in one year as it has in the preceding three or four. If the trees
are transplanted previous to the time that the tap-root reaches this
moisture and before the tree starts its rapid growth, very few young trees
are lost in the process of transplanting.
Orchard Planting
For orchard planting the trees should be placed from forty to sixty
feet apart and by staggering the rows a greater distance is gained between
individual trees. Any other small fruits may be planted in the orchard
between the walnut trees or any cultivated crop can be raised
satisfactorily on the same land, many orchardists gaining triple use of
the soil in this way. Besides, the cultivation of the earth in proximity
to the walnuts proves of great benefit to the trees. Before trees are
planted the tap-root should be trimmed or cut back and most if not all the
lateral branches trimmed from the tree. The tree itself should not be cut
back as is customary with either fruit trees, but by[14]
leaving the terminal bud intact, a much better shaped tree is developed.
It is not necessary to prune English Walnut trees except in cases where
some of the lower branches interfere with cultivation.
Cultivation in the North should be stopped about the first of August,
thus halting the growth of the trees and giving them a chance to harden
their wood for Winter. This is a good plan to follow in the cultivation of
nearly all the smaller fruit trees.
When planting on the lawn for ornamental purposes a ring from two to
three feet in diameter should be cultivated about the base of the
tree.
Selection of Varieties
The tender varieties that have been used in Southern California must
not be experimented with in the North, as they bloom too early and are
almost certain to be caught by the frost. These varieties have been tried
in Northern California without success, and the venture is quite likely to
be disastrous in any but the warmest climates.
Mr. E.C. Pomeroy, Gathering
English Walnuts on His Farm in Lockport, N.Y.
[15]The uncertainty of a crop is often due to the
very early blooming of the kinds planted. These start to grow at the first
warm spell in the latter part of the Winter or at the first blush of
Spring, and almost invariably become victims of frost and consequently
produce no fruit.
Planting in the Northwest and the East until recently has been limited
to an extremely narrow area. There was need of a variety possessing
strong, distinct characteristics, hardy, late to start growth, and with
the pistillate and staminate blossoms maturing at the same time and
bearing a nut of good quality and flavor with a full rich meat. This
variety has now been found, as will later be shown.
English Walnuts grown in the North command from three to five cents
more a pound than the other nuts in the markets, as the meat is plumper
and the flavor better. Most fruit is at its best at the Northern limit of
its range.
One experienced grower, in reference to transplanting has said: "I have
transplanted all the way from a year to six and[16] the
trees have grown and done well, but so far as my experience goes, I prefer
to move them at three years of age or about that time. The best trees I
have were transplanted at this age."
Fall or Spring Planting?
The following extract on tree planting in general, pertaining to all
kinds of trees, is contributed by O.K. White of the Michigan Experiment
Station:
"The advisability of Fall or Spring planting depends upon
several conditions. Fall planting has the advantage over Spring planting
in that the trees become firmly established in the soil before Winter sets
in, and are able to start growth in the Spring before the ground can be
marked and put in condition for planting. This is important because the
trees get a good growth in the early part of the season before the Summer
droughts occur. On the other hand there is more or less danger from Winter
injury during a severe season or from the drying out of the trees if [17] the Winter is long and dry. Fall planting is
much more successful with the hardy apples and pears than it is with the
tender plums, cherries and peaches.
"The convenience of the season will determine in a majority of cases
whether or not the planting shall be done in the Fall or Spring. Very
often the rush of the Spring work induces the grower to hurry his
planting, or to do it carelessly; and as a result a poor start is secured,
with crooked rows. Others have large crops to harvest in the Fall and
would find it more convenient to do the planting in the Spring. If there
is any doubt as to the best time to plant, let it be in the
Spring."
Thirty Year Old Parent English
Walnut Trees In Background, Young Bearing Tree in Front
Fertilizing
We now come to the subject of fertilization. Up to the time when the
young trees come into bearing, cultivation and fertilization will help
them enormously, the cultivation keeping the soil in condition to hold the
moisture of the tree. In[18] fertilizing, a
mulch of stable manure in the Fall is considered by most growers to be the
best, but the following preparation is thought to be exceptionally good
for all young orchards:
Dried blood, 1,000 pounds; bone meal, 550 pounds; sulphate of potash,
350 pounds. Total, 2,000 pounds. This should be applied close up and about
the tree, extending out each year in a circle somewhat beyond the spread
of the branches.
This provides a quickly available plant food, rich in nitrogen and
especially recommended for rapid growth.
After the tap-root reaches the sub-soil moisture it is well able to
take care of the tree; and both cultivation and fertilization may then be
stopped. In fact, by this time practically no further care is needed in
the nut orchard with the exception of that required at the harvesting
time, and this is a pleasant and easy occupation, especially in the
Northern and Eastern states where the frost opens[19] the
shuck and the nuts drop free upon the ground where they may be picked up
and put into sacks of 110 to 120 pounds each, ready for the market.
Just before the first frost it is a very good idea to remove all leaves
from the ground so that when the nuts fall they can be readily seen and
gathered. An excellent method of accomplishing this is by means of a horse
and rake. The nuts may be left on the ground to dry or may be removed to
any convenient place for that purpose.
The Different Kinds
There are three distinct kinds of English Walnuts—hard-shell,
soft-shell and paper-shell, the soft-shell being the best. Each of these
three is divided into a number of varieties, the names of some of the more
popular ones being the Barthere, Chaberte, Cluster, Drew, Ford,
Franquette, Gant or Bijou, Grand Noblesse, Lanfray, Mammoth, Mayette,
Wiltz Mayette, Mesange, Meylan, Mission, Parisienne, Poorman,[20] Proeparturiens, Santa Barbara, Pomeroy,
Serotina, Sexton, Vourey, Concord, Chase and the Eureka.
The question of the best varieties for planting in the North as well as
in the South is somewhat open to discussion, due largely to a lack of
sufficient information in regard to some of the more promising kinds.
There is but little question that the best proven variety for the
Northwest is the Franquette and for the East and Northeast, the Pomeroy.
Both of these are good producers bearing a fine nut, well filled with a
white meat of excellent flavor, and of good shape and commanding the
highest market prices. The two varieties are also very late in starting in
the Spring making them safe against the late frosts. Their pistillate and
staminate blossoms mature at the same time.
English Walnuts Bear in
Clusters of Two to Five
The white-meated nut is far superior to any other. The browning or
staining is caused by the extremely dry heat and sun in the far South. In
the North or[21] where the tree
has an abundant thick foliage the meat is invariably whiter.
The Mission Nut
The Mission Nut was introduced by the priests of Los Angeles and is the
pioneer Persian Walnut of California. Most of the bearing orchards of the
state are composed of seedling trees of this type. The nut is medium-sized
with a hard shell of ordinary thickness. It succeeds admirably in a few
favored districts (of Southern California) but fails in productiveness
farther North. Its most prominent faults are—early blooming, in
consequence of which it is often caught by the late frosts; the irregular
and unequal blooming of its pistillate and staminate blossoms, and the
consequent failure of the former to be fertilized and to develop nuts; and
lateness in ripening its wood in the Fall and consequent liability to
injury by frost at that time.
The Santa Barbara Nut
The Santa Barbara English Walnut (soft-shell) variety is about ten days
later than the Mission in starting growth and[22] in
blooming in the Spring. It fruits from four to six years from seed and
usually produces a full crop every year. It is not as strong a grower as
the Mission and more trees can be grown to the acre. The shells are thin
and easily broken, therefore the nuts are sometimes damaged in long
shipment. The kernel is white and of very fine quality.
The Pomeroy Nut
The Pomeroy variety was started in a most peculiar and interesting way.
The late Norman Pomeroy of Lockport, New York, made the discovery quite by
accident. When he was in Philadelphia in 1876 visiting the Centennial
Exposition, he awoke one morning to be greeted by the leaves of a gorgeous
tree, which just touched his window and through which the sun shone
brightly. He soon was examining a magnificent English Walnut tree. On the
ground directly under he found the nuts, which had fallen during the
night. Their flavor was more delicious and the meat fuller than any he had
ever before tasted.[23] The shell was
unusually thin and Mr. Pomeroy was astonished, for he never believed the
English Walnut grew in the East.
Knowing the varieties grown in California could not be raised in the
East or North, he questioned his landlord and found that this particular
tree had been brought from Northern Europe. Mr. Pomeroy determined at once
that possibly this variety would be hardy enough for cultivation in New
York State. He procured some of the nuts and put them in his satchel which
he entrusted to a neighbor who was about to start home. The neighbor
reached home all right and so did the nuts—but—the neighbor's children
found the rare delicacies and ate all but seven. They would doubtless have
eaten these too but fortunately they had slipped into the lining of the
satchel where Mr. Pomeroy found them on his return to Lockport. These
seven nuts, which had so narrow an escape from oblivion, are now seven
beautiful English Walnut trees, sixty or more feet high and[24] the progenitors of the Pomeroy orchards, all
of which are now producing nuts like the originals—a very fine
quality.
Some uses of English Walnuts
English Walnuts to be used for making pickles, catsup, oil and other
culinary products, are gathered when the fruit is about half mature or
when the shell is soft enough to yield to the influence of cooking. The
proper stage can be determined by piercing the nut with a needle, a
certain degree of hardness being desired. The nut is often utilized for
olive oil in some parts of Europe. It takes one hundred pounds of nuts to
make eighteen pounds of oil.
In England the nuts are preserved fresh for the table where they are
served with wine. They are buried deep in dry soil or sand so as not to be
reached by frost, the sun's rays or rain; or by placing them in dry
cellars and covering with straw. Others seal them up in tin cans filled
with sand. [25]
Examples of Hardiness
As an illustration of the hardiness of the English Walnut, there is a
tree at Red Hill, Virginia, which was brought from Edinburgh, Scotland,
when six months old, planted in New York, where it remained three years,
then removed to Staunton, Virginia, and after two years taken to Red Hill.
In consequence of so many changes, the tree at first died back, but is now
thrifty—twenty feet high; trunk, eight inches in diameter at the
ground.
During several severe Winters, the thermometer fell so low that some
peach trees and grape vines growing near English Walnuts on the Pomeroy
farm near Lockport, N.Y. were killed, while the nut trees were not in the
least injured.
[26]
The English Walnut at its Best.
A smooth, soft-shelled nut.
Meat full, with sweet, hickory-nut flavor.
Nuts fall clean and free from outside shuck.
Frosts harvest the nuts—in October.
They are self-pruning.
Require no care after arrival at bearing age.
An alkali sap keeps scales and pests from the trees.
Blossoms immune from late frosts, as they start late.
Pistillate and Staminate blossoms mature at same time in the
best varieties, insuring perfect fertilization and productivity.
Bears more regularly than other nut trees.
Bears heavier crops the older it becomes, unlike other fruit
trees the size and quality of whose fruit degenerates with
age.
[27]
Interesting Figures about the English Walnut.
In Spain and Southern France there are trees believed to be
more than 300 years old which bear from fifteen to eighteen bushels of
nuts each, annually.
In Whittier, California, is a famous tree which has been
leased for a term of years at $500.
Orchards seven and eight years old bring all the way from
$1,000 to $2,000 per acre and are a fine investment, yielding from 15 to
125 per cent. according to age.
The total cost of producing and harvesting an English Walnut
crop is about one and one-half cents a pound.
[28]
Kernels of Fact about the English Walnut.
The United States consumes more than 50,000,000 pounds a
year.
The United States imports about 27,000,000 pounds a
year.
The price is advancing steadily with the demand.
Besides being profitable, the English Walnut is a clean,
highly ornamental shade tree.
The leaves remain on the tree until late in the Fall, not
littering up the ground during the Summer.
English Walnuts are not only a rare table delicacy, but may
be utilized for catsup, pickles and oil.
One pound of walnut meat equals eight pounds of steak in
nutriment—and is a far more healthful food.
[29]
What Luther Burbank has to say:
"When you plant another tree, why not plant the English
Walnut? Then, besides sentiment, shade and leaves, you may have a
perennial supply of nuts, the improved kind of which furnish the most
delicious, nutritious and healthful food which has ever been known. The
consumption of nuts is probably increasing among all civilized nations
today faster than that of any other food; and we should keep up with this
growing demand and make it still more rapid by producing nuts of uniform
good quality, with a consequent increase in the health and a permanent
increase in the wealth of ourselves and neighbors."—From Address at
Santa Rosa, California, in the Fall of 1905.
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