they are tastey but i like the shell bark hickerys better . they are bigger

we seldome eat the hickerys as we have several walnuts on the creek bottoms that IMHO taste better

 

Mine always have worms in them.

 

If they're ripe enough to fall from the tree the husks should break off fairly easy. Best cake I ever had was a hickory nut cake. It's work to get them shelled but worth it in my book.

 

when i was helping this older lady with a bathroom remodel last february, she had shellbarks all over her driveway. they were good! that reminds me...i need to go and see her, lol.

 

In the last place (before we moved into this house in April), there were woods with one big hickory tree that dropped many nuts. The shells will evewntually split and you can shuck them off.

 

Shell bark and shag bark are the best hickory nuts. They are the hickories that you can often extract the whole kernel. Our favorite! The hulls should come off fairly easy. Put a nut on the ground and roll it under your foot (with shoes on). They should come right off.

 

Get 'em now, you probably won't have a good harvest next year... seem like an every other year thing for the most part.

Ours are very tasty and no worms.

 

Once they dry, the outre cover will split and fall off. Getting the "meat" out of them is a time consuming process. That's why you didn't have any competition for them. Quiet winter evenings is a goot time to crack and pick. Very tastey.
If I could find some nuts that shell easily and are fairly large, i'd like to try growing some trees from those nuts. Not sure they would be hardy to this area, but worth a try.

 

ajaxlucy, you should get the hulls off as quickly as possible. What we do is collect them in 5 gallon buckets. Once you have the bottom of the bucket covered 2-3 deep or so, swirl them around (really builds those arm muscles). The hull should break off in 4 sections. If a section is still on you can just pry it off.

Pick out the nuts and check for wormholes. Toss the ones with worm holes away. Toss the good nuts into a seperate bucket.

Once you have collected all the nuts you want, you will want to dry them. Don't put them out in direct sunlight as the heat can cook and ruin them.

We have wire racks that we use for drying black walnuts and hickory nuts. You want good air flow so don't have more than one layer of nuts.

Once the hickory nuts are ready to eat, crack away. You don't get a lot of meat from any single nut but they sure are good. Store the nuts (in the shell) in a cool dry place. You also want to make sure that rodents and insects can't get at them.

Try googling around for places selling hickory nut meat. Last I checked prices were over $20/lb. When we sell what we collect from our farm we sell them in the shell. Hickory trees produce nuts bi-annually. So you will have one good year and one year with little or no nuts.

Last year we collected a couple hundred pounds of hickory nuts without even trying. This year we left what little there was for the squirrels.

Hope this helps.

Mike

 

Boy that helps me! I was wondering why I found a bumper crop last year and none this year.

I like to freeze them and take out one or two at at time for a snack. I use a hammer and crack them in my cast iron pan. It keeps the shells from going everywhere. Two nuts really fill my munch habit and are very healthy. I like these better than walnuts and they are easier to get out of the shell than walnuts (less messier with the inkiness too).

 

Shell bark is just a variety of shagbark hickory.

 

This was good to know. Last year we had a bumper crop of hickory and black walnuts...this year nothing. I knew the squirrels couldn't have gotten them all!

 

MY Livestock Guardian Dogs cheated us out of a harvest this past year!!!

I couldn't understand it at first - we have so many of the shagbarks and there were so little nuts ;-) Until I caught them!

They are wonderful! Butternuts are good too.

Andrea