Here at Exclamation
Pointe, autumn is a tranquil time when the subtle shift in the winds and
the gradual drop in the temperatures, foretell of winter to come and
turn our minds toward thoughts of the natural cycle of life; of death
and rebirth. We relax after the long summer to enjoy the harvest
and to bask in these peaceful moments..
Peaceful that is, until
the Black Walnuts start to fall, and then it's every man for himself as each wayward gust of wind
brings, instead of memories of summer and youth, rather six, ten or a dozen of the fragrant green missiles pelting down upon us, crashing onto the
roof in a near-constant barrage, clogging the gutters and downspouts,
terrorizing pets and livestock and covering the lawn and sidewalk with
the best opportunities for broken bones or dislocated discs that we'll
get until the next ice storm makes it's way into our neighborhood.
In only a few days, our
once-inviting lawn is strewn with the tennis-ball-sized nuggets and they
just... keep... coming... so that as we sprint to our car from
the house, hoping to avoid the falling walnut hazard, we run with one
eye focused on the tree-tops and one on the ground, so as to maintain our balance over the sea of
nuts that stretches out before us.
That, of course, is because
we're lucky enough to have several large, mature Black Walnut trees (Juglans
nigra) in our yard.
If this doesn't sound like such
good luck to you, then let me assure you that, ruined rumps and crushed
coccyges not withstanding, anyone is fortunate who has several Black
Walnut trees on his or her property.
That's because, while
Black Walnuts seed themselves easily from the millions of nuts that fall
to earth, like most nut trees, they are especially slow-growing and it
takes quite a while for them to mature sufficiently to bear nuts.
Even though some seed production
may occur on trees grown in the open under ideal conditions (deep,
well-drained, nearly neutral soils that are generally moist and fertile)
they don't usually begin to produce prolifically until they reach 20 or
30 years of age and continuing for about another 100 years thereafter.
So why should you care even the
slightest about when nut production begins? Read on.
In it's
distribution range, there is no wild tree growing on the homestead that
will produce more cash per acre for the landowner than Black Walnut.
To note the most apparent value first, these trees produce the most
precious hardwood available from
native American sources; a single tree of sufficient girth, height and
straightness as to be suitable for veneer production can yield the
land-owner upwards of a thousand dollars in logs because the dark,
dense hardwood is prized above all others for its beauty, hardness and
durability. The
wood is used for fine furniture of all kinds and for interior
paneling, specialty products, and gunstocks.
The trouble with that is that, in order to take advantage
of this value, one obviously has to cut down the tree; quite a loss
since Black Walnut has many other virtues beyond being a mere timber
source.
For example, it was a given
among old-timers (who paid attention to such things in the days before
air conditioning) that the shade from the walnut was cooler and more
comfortable than that of other, lesser species. Given sixty or
seventy years to spread its boughs in open sun, a single Black Walnut
tree may produce a
crown 80 or 100 feet across the lawn, and the delicate compound leaves produce
dense shade, while allowing heat to travel upward through the tree.
