7 November 2013

AN ABUNDANCE OF WALNUTS

It was a good walnut harvest in the Loire this year.  The many walnut trees around the village produced a huge crop and we collected a few in our pockets or in a bag every time we took the dog for her twice or thrice daily walk around the château.  (We always have suitable bags in our pockets being dog owners.  Lulu doesn’t often disgrace herself but you never know).

walnuts1

We brought a large bagful back with us and yesterday I realised the bag was still exactly where I had dumped it when we got home.  So I tipped out the walnuts to have a look at them, make sure they were dry and start shelling a few.

walnuts

The question is, what should I do with these?  Would it be worth planting them?  Does anybody want a walnut tree as we don’t have room for one ~ not one that’s big enough to give us walnuts anyway !!

6 comments:

  1. I wonder about planting walnut trees from nuts. Will the tree, if it grows, produce nice fat walnuts, or scrawny little knots. I know that pecan trees in North Carolina have to be grafted to be turned into producers of nice nuts. Other than that question, I'd love to have a big noyer on our property. Or even better, a pecan tree.

    ReplyDelete
  2. We would love one... We thought we had one when we moved it as it looks like a walnut tree. We think it is some kind of willow... It is due for a heavy pruning sometime soooooon. Love the header... wait well you are growing them like that!

    ReplyDelete
  3. We regretfully had to cut a huge walnut tree down just after we arrived here because it was growing into the side of the middle barn, which was causing the walls of the barn to break apart. Even now I miss that tree! As for the other walnut trees on the property, they are either in the woodland so we can't find the nuts in the long grass, or the nuts fall into the field and are immediately pounced upon by the goats and sheep!
    I think I might plant those sprouting nuts, just to see if they will grow.

    ReplyDelete
  4. Plant them in a pot... each... and give them to your friends as a genuine French walnut tree...
    let your friends wait the fifteen years until they start to produce good fruit...
    They won't produce scrawny little nuts... but they probably won't be as big as commercial ones.

    When you get your larger property, try and choose one that has a noyer that's reasonably mature... for both the shade and the nuts.

    As for pecan trees [pacanier or noyer de pécan] they will only fruit in France if you get strains that originate from the Northern US... and to get fruit you will need two different cultivars... but the pollinator won't need to be a northern strain, just the nutter! And you'll probably have to wait a good 15 to 20 years as well...

    Love the header picture!! All those wierd squashes....

    ReplyDelete
  5. I’d love to have a walnut tree in our French garden, but realistically it isn't going to happen unless I shell out for a good-sized commercial sapling. A friend gave me a tiny walnut shoot last year but it's making very slow growth. :-( That said, it does seem a shame not to plant them in pots and see what happens.

    ReplyDelete
  6. I'd plant it just for the fun of it. But, oh how I love walnuts.

    ReplyDelete