My sister brought over a bunch of walnuts from her trees about 4 years ago. We had kept them in an area where the squirrels squirrelled away many of them. Last year I noticed some new trees growing in an area, no clue what they were until this year. They are clearly walnut trees, clearly the squirrels had dug them below ground and they are producing walnuts this year. Still hanging on the tree. No clue what type of walnut, all I know is that they are good, my sister always brings us these delicious walnuts. Is there a "typical" walnut that grows in our Lower Mainland of B.C.? I am wanting to know the name of this walnut tree, it sure did grow FAST. The other question, having never grown walnuts before. Does one have to wait for the nuts to fall off the tree? Can they be picked and let ripen on their own? When are the walnuts ready to eat? Elaborating deeply would surely be a nice thing here. Have that wonderful day, Cindi
I would DEFINETLY! wear gloves. I discovered the City-planted-trees in the parking stip in San Jose CA. were English Walnuts - went nuts gathering the little green apples and laying them in the garage to dry. My hands turned BLACK from the juice in the apples. Having new relatives that were very familiar with walnuts, boy did I get laughed at. It took weeks and lots of bleach to get rid of the dye. If your a weaver it's a great souce of a dark brown dye. As I understand it English walnut are grafted to a hardy (for here) root stock, not sure about the Black walnuts. Anyway have fun!! barb
Black walnut, English walnut, more than one kind of Asian walnut and the butternut are all seen in local plantings. The prevalent one in more recent plantings, as in trees brought home from local retail outlets is English walnut.
Grafting on black walnut was a failure. Presumably vegetatively propagated named forms of Juglans regia are grafted onto English walnut seedlings. Others sold are seed strains. Don't know why this area would require a special rootstock, there are English walnut trees all over here. We have large examples of all the major walnut species throughout the region. See Van Pelt, Champion Trees of Washington State (1996, University of Washington, Seattle) for dimensions and locations of examples. Some years ago there was a fruiting example of Japanese heartnut in Causland Memorial Park (710 N Avenue), Anacortes.
Thanks Ron. I live about 10 blocks West of Causland Park (We call it Rock Park because of all the intricate rock step and walls). I'll try to find it find it and check it out. barb
If it's still there, you can't miss it. It's over above the row of monkey puzzle street trees, on the north side. Looking west there is nothing to obscure it from the open area at the east end of the park. The nuts are like jumbo filberts, the leaves and branching the typical equally outsized ones of Japanese walnut. It's not big enough to be listed in Van Pelt's book but six other trees from Anacortes are: - A 64' tall seaside juniper in Washington Park (listed as Rocky Mountain juniper) - An 82' tall Scouler willow in Washington Park - A 53' wide Scouler willow in Washington Park - A 27' tall Balearic holly in Causland Park - A Japanese larch 5'3" around in Causland Park - A 37' wide spreading English yew in Causland Park
