iDRY Vacuum Kilns

Sponsors:

Planting Walnuts,,, will they grow?

Started by Rat Rod Mac, November 26, 2017, 08:54:55 AM

Previous topic - Next topic

0 Members and 1 Guest are viewing this topic.

Rat Rod Mac

I've got a couple of walnut trees on my place and I have been gathering up the walnut hulls from the ground in five gallon buckets and planting them throughout my woods. Will any of these turn into trees? Or am I wasting my time? If some will make it what percentage would you guess. 10% maybe. I would be very happy if 10% would turn into trees.
We are going to have a small timber harvest later this winter and take out as many ash as possible and a few poplar, so I'm planting the walnut hulls close to where these trees are located thinking they will get the sun light when the host trees are harvested. Any and all comments are welcomed. Thanks.    RRM

btulloh

I don't know for sure, but they probably will.  Squirrels plant walnuts around my place and they grow quite well.  Usually in the middle of flower beds and other places I don't want them.  They plant them so the top of the nut is just barely below the surface.  It's probably best to let the husk fall off first, although I'm not sure it makes a big difference.  Sometimes I gather walnuts in the loader bucket and just dumb them in the woods and let the squirrels plant them for me.  It may not be the best way for managed walnut trees but it's efficient. 

There will probably be someone along to provide a more educated answer to your question.  Good luck with the walnut tree management and welcome to the Forestry Forum.
HM126

mike_belben

If the soil is suitable for native walnut to begin with i cant see how it wouldnt propogate. 
Praise The Lord

Rat Rod Mac

Ok fella's thanks. I'll keep on planting.      RRM

VirginiaFarm

I hauled several hundred pounds of walnuts out of our yard and into the woods yesterday. I'm betting the squirrels will bring some of them back near the house. There seems to be a missed opportunity for Hammond walnut buyers in eastern Virginia and Eastern US. We can't keep the walnut saplings down, and we have quite a few good sized trees.

Does anybody have current stumpage figures on Black Walnut?

TKehl

Can't tell you what percentage grows, but plant more than you need and thin if you get too many.  Depends on how hungry your squirrels are.   :D

Worked good when grandpa established our Black Walnut patch.  Regens naturally now.

As for stumpage prices, here are some Missouri numbers:
https://mdc.mo.gov/sites/default/files/downloads/TPTAprJun2017.pdf
In the long run, you make your own luck – good, bad, or indifferent. Loretta Lynn

Autocar

If your going to have a skidder moving around I would throw them down before your harvest, skidders moving ground will stat alot of young trees by disturbing the soil.
Bill

SwampDonkey

They should grow, I have done it for years with butternuts. They will come up within a year or two.  ;D
"No amount of belief makes something a fact." James Randi

1 Thessalonians 5:21

2020 Polaris Ranger 570 to forward firewood, Husqvarna 555 XT Pro, Stihl FS560 clearing saw and continuously thinning my ground, on the side. Grow them trees. (((o)))

larry1

My buddy in Southern Ontario has huge walnut trees in his yard and the nuts have been culivated across the road producing a healthy 14-16" stand in about 40 years .

MbfVA

 I'm listening, and I'm in Virginia like Btulloh above (Did I get that right). What sort of spacing are you guys recommending, if I want to do the squirrels job for them a little more precisely?   My Forester tells me they grow like crazy when they  can grow in the open without a lot of competition.

I am assuming, correctly I hope, that using walnuts from my property and planting them elsewhere on my property would probably give the best chance of success, rather than buying something and or transporting walnuts from somewhere else.
www.ordinary.com (really)

VirginiaFarm

Quote from: TKehl on November 26, 2017, 03:13:45 PM
Can't tell you what percentage grows, but plant more than you need and thin if you get too many.  Depends on how hungry your squirrels are.   :D

Worked good when grandpa established our Black Walnut patch.  Regens naturally now.

As for stumpage prices, here are some Missouri numbers:
https://mdc.mo.gov/sites/default/files/downloads/TPTAprJun2017.pdf

Thank you for the stumpage report. Does anybody have any experiences with marketing black walnut?

Here in Eastern Virginia, walnuts totally take over our property. If I wait a week cutting grass, the walnuts start sprouting all over the yard. I have heard that they don't like sandy soil, but that doesn't seem to disturb them here.

As for spacing, I would plant them every 4 or 5 feet from each other and thin down to every 8 or 12 feet after picking the better stems. Nutrient and sunlight competition will yield much different results from open planting, but hopefully produce straighter stems.

MbfVA

 Thanks Virginia farmer. I'm west of 95, on route 15 just south of I 64.

We have a great deal of river bottom land, that floods every so often, every few years though it quickly recedes each time.  I wonder if the walnut trees would work out there.

The biggest walnut on our property almost got her feet wet in the flood in 2010.  Hiking up her skirt she was.  I don't know of any that are actually in the floodplain, but I really haven't looked.  The flooding doesn't seem to bother the sycamores along the riverbank, or the various other trees here and there.   In fact one area seems to grow various hardwoods with a vengeance.   I have been Bush hogging it, though it is outside our conservation fencing, so I may just let it grow up and see what trees come up, then thin them appropriately.
www.ordinary.com (really)

nativewolf

Quote from: VirginiaFarm on November 26, 2017, 01:50:02 PM
I hauled several hundred pounds of walnuts out of our yard and into the woods yesterday. I'm betting the squirrels will bring some of them back near the house. There seems to be a missed opportunity for Hammond walnut buyers in eastern Virginia and Eastern US. We can't keep the walnut saplings down, and we have quite a few good sized trees.

Does anybody have current stumpage figures on Black Walnut?

Hey there fellow Virginian.  Prices vary wildly.  Send me a PM with your phone and I'd be glad to give you all the info I've learned over the last couple of years.  Always glad to hear of another Virginian on the board.   The long and short of it is that there are 4 different markets, broken down into export and domestic.  So you have metric and english lengths, grade, diameter, defect, etc.  $0.80-$7.00/bdft is the range in Virginia but I think you can do even a bit better in prime walnut territory.   
Liking Walnut

nativewolf

Quote from: MbfVA on November 27, 2017, 04:19:59 AM
Thanks Virginia farmer. I'm west of 95, on route 15 just south of I 64.

We have a great deal of river bottom land, that floods every so often, every few years though it quickly recedes each time.  I wonder if the walnut trees would work out there.

The biggest walnut on our property almost got her feet wet in the flood in 2010.  Hiking up her skirt she was.  I don't know of any that are actually in the floodplain, but I really haven't looked.  The flooding doesn't seem to bother the sycamores along the riverbank, or the various other trees here and there.   In fact one area seems to grow various hardwoods with a vengeance.   I have been Bush hogging it, though it is outside our conservation fencing, so I may just let it grow up and see what trees come up, then thin them appropriately.

Glad to see you thinking of planting walnut.  If you don't have enough nuts the forest service saplings are cheap.  They'll grow just fine, maybe a bit too fast but it will not bother the buyers too much.
Liking Walnut

mike_belben

Sawlog prices at the nearest mill to me in middle TN start at .30/bf for under 10" diameter pallet grade, jump to a dollar for 10" 3common, $2/bf for 15" 3SC and $2.60-3.00/bf for veneer. 

Ive only seen walnut in yards, not encountered a single one in the woods.  I assume its all been cut. 
Praise The Lord

TKehl

I've seen people loose a lot of money cutting and marketing their own Black Walnut.  I have dad talked into doing a thinning cut that we will get bids on and have a logger come and cut. 

Locally, a lot of the loggers won't buck them.  They are drug out tree length and bucked where the buyer says to cut.

MbfVA, some of our best Walnut is on creek banks.  It floods from time to time, but goes back down in a few hours to a day.  Can't speak beyond that, so I guess it depends on your definition of "quickly recedes".   ;)

We are planting a small bottom piece to Walnut this winter.  Maybe 4 acres too rocky and flood prone to crop.  I'm going at 5' spacing in row and 30' between rows.  This is mainly so we can hay between the rows while the Walnut matures. 
In the long run, you make your own luck – good, bad, or indifferent. Loretta Lynn

78NHTFY

Only plant walnut trees near your home if:
1) You love squirrels and want them to nest in your house (or enjoy target practice :D)
2) You enjoy picking us hundreds and hundreds of pounds of nuts every Fall and disposing of them
3) You like raking the leaves/stems that cover the ground like a thick mat
4) You need the exercise picking up the many broken off branches after any wind event
5) You want many of your other trees killed off (apple, red maple, rock maple, soft maple, etc) by the walnut trees which have a toxic substance (juglone) deadly for other trees.
6) You love hearing your wife say "get rid of all of them now!" on a weekly basis over a decade....

Sorry, not a fan.  It's a dirty, invasive tree IMHO.  Only good for one thing: cutting down and sawing up 8) 8).   Am getting there, slowly.  All the best, Rob.
If you have time, you win....

Corley5

  I've had good luck dropping the nuts where I want them and heeling them into the ground.  Running over them with the riding lawnmower wheels will do it too if the ground is soft ;) ;D  We've got several large mature trees around the house and barnyard which produce too many nuts and are very messy trees as already mentioned.  Grandma hated them and kept a jug of Round Up to kill any that sprouted anywhere near the buildings or in the yard.  We cut one down by the house for her that kept her awake at night dropping nuts on the roof ;D  Every nook and cranny in every building has been filled with nuts by the squirrels.  I've been planting some else where on the farm where they won't cause trouble :)
Burnt Gunpowder is the Smell Of Freedom

campwags

I for one have planted grafted Black Walnuts for timber production.  They have been in the ground for ten years now... My son will have a good harvest.  I had hoped they would pay for his college but not growing fast enough.   :P :o ???
Life is for Living, Loving and Laughing; Not Crying and Complaining!

TK 2000, Woodmaster 718, Kioti DK65s w/Farmi JL501, Kioti NX4510 and a Kubota KX 41-3 excavator, Japa firewood processor and an assortment of trailers, solar kiln and out buildings.

nativewolf

78nh, I've  will be glad to get rid of yours for you:)
Liking Walnut

nativewolf

Quote from: TKehl on November 27, 2017, 09:12:47 AM
I've seen people loose a lot of money cutting and marketing their own Black Walnut.  I have dad talked into doing a thinning cut that we will get bids on and have a logger come and cut. 

Locally, a lot of the loggers won't buck them.  They are drug out tree length and bucked where the buyer says to cut.

MbfVA, some of our best Walnut is on creek banks.  It floods from time to time, but goes back down in a few hours to a day.  Can't speak beyond that, so I guess it depends on your definition of "quickly recedes".   ;)

We are planting a small bottom piece to Walnut this winter.  Maybe 4 acres too rocky and flood prone to crop.  I'm going at 5' spacing in row and 30' between rows.  This is mainly so we can hay between the rows while the Walnut matures.

Exactly, knowing where to cut walnut is a tree by tree decision.  Easy to loose 500 in one mid cut log, we have spent a huge amount of time getting the grading rules down pat.  Even then we second guess some, walnut does not mind flooding as long as it dries out Within a week or two, lots of walnut in the bottoms of the Mississippi and Missouri rivers and we all know how much they flood
Liking Walnut

mike_belben

So basically what we're saying is Walnut is like a hickory thats actually worth money?

  ;D
Praise The Lord

nativewolf

 :D
Quote from: mike_belben on November 27, 2017, 04:30:16 PM
So basically what we're saying is Walnut is like a hickory thats actually worth money?

  ;D

Guess so
Liking Walnut

MbfVA

I think this particular thread is loaded with wal-nuts.  I'll bet you guys shop at Wal-mart, too.  And buy your drugs at Wal-greens.   And when you fish, you fish for Wal-leyes.

Yeah, if you get your hands on me you'll give me a...

Wal-lup.

I think I'll go plant some trees.
www.ordinary.com (really)

roger 4400

I live 30 miles north of Montreal,Quebec.  Overhere I had 100 walnut trees  8 years ago. 25 survived and this year 2 walnut trees gave me 8 nuts  :laugh:.
If I want to grow some trees from my walnut nuts do I have to peel them and only put the nuts in ground ( maybe 3 inches deep ) or will they freeze so much they will not grow ?
Or do I have to put them in a refrigerator in a humid bag with peat moss and watch them in 3 to 4 month to see if they will germinate ?
Baker 18hd sawmill, massey Ferguson 1643, Farmi winch, mini forwarder, Honda foreman 400, f-250, many wood working tools, 200 acres wooden lots,6 kids and a lovely and a comprehensive wife...and now a Metavic 1150 m14 log loader so my tractor is a forwarder now

Thank You Sponsors!