How to Harvest and Shell Black Walnuts

it's early October in Pennsylvania and I am foraging for Eastern black walnuts this tree is native to most of the eastern half of the United States and southern Ontario it is not native to Florida most of New York or the New England states I'll show you how to identify the trees harvest the fruits and process the nuts these are two Eastern black walnut trees this is what the trunk of the tree looks like these are the fruits on the tree the leaves look like this here's some of the fruits that have fallen to the ground we just had a frost and the tree dropped its fruits the ideal time to pick them is when they're green and they look like this and you can push in a little bit with your thumb and leave an indentation the color can bury some fruits look a little more yellow the fruits can vary in size the leaves and stems and fruits of the walnut tree have a very distinct odor the harvested fruits should have that distinct smell avoid picking up fruits that look like this after the fruits are harvested the outer hull should be promptly removed there are many methods there's not really a correct way you should do the way that works best for you some people step on them and roll them under their foot to remove the hole you can run them over with a car a hole the size of the nut can be drilled into a board and then the nut is pushed through the hole letting the shell behind some people even put them in cement mixers with stones I like to take a sharp knife and cut entirely around the outer hull and then twist it you'd what to wear gloves to do this and then squeeze the nut out of the half that it sticks into this hole has some worms in it and they won't harm the nut after the holes have been removed from the nuts discard the halls it's not advisable to compost them there's a toxin in black walnuts that kills some plants clean off the remaining Hall from the nuts some people pressure wash them put them in a bucket and had to take them around with an old broomstick you could scrub them with a brush again be mindful not to dump the water around any plants after the remainder of the holes have been removed and the nuts have been washed to prevent mold during the curing process but the nuts on a screen in the Sun for a few hours make sure the squirrels don't steal your work if you can't put them in the Sun put them in an oven maybe 90 to 100 degrees for about 12 hours after the nuts are thoroughly dried bring them inside and hang them in mesh bags or put them on a screen the curing process takes a minimum of two weeks ideally you should cure them for four to six weeks before you crack them after the nuts are cured it's time to crack them notice that the nuts can look different if you recall earlier in the video I showed you two different fruits and they were significantly different sizes some people like to crack the nut with a hammer you place the nut on a hard surface and then strike the top of the nut with a hammer safety glasses are a good idea I prefer to use a vise place the nut between the jaws of the vise and then slowly close the vise and crack the nut open use a pair of diagonal pliers to remove the nut neat from the rest of the shell can just snip away at the outer parts you to help eliminate any shell debris vibrate the nutmeats on top of a screen with one-eighth inch spacing for long-term storage freeze the nut needs if you found this video helpful please consider giving me a thumbs up and thanks for watching

Channel: diane r

Views: 562,561

Rating: 4.8568153 out of 5

Keywords: how to, instructional video, tutorial, shell black walnuts, crack black walnuts, what do with black walnut, process black walnuts, harvest black walnuts, hull black walnuts, remove shell black walnuts, husk black walnuts, ripe black walnuts, ready pick black walnuts, when pick black walnuts, gather black walnuts, deshell black walnuts, easy way shell black walnuts, easy way remove shell black walnut, quickly shell black walnut, clean black walnuts

Id: mjs8z18vuz4

Length: 7min 1sec (421 seconds)

Published: Fri Oct 14 2016