Questions for people who process pecans from a tree...

[mrteddyprincess]

I'm in Central Indiana and I grew up here never once seeing a pecan tree.

But it turns out that we do have pecan trees--they grow but don't usually produce pecans. A colleague of mine eyeballed a tree covered in pods and he had no idea what kind of tree it was. He used an app on his phone to determine it's a pecan tree.

Our best guess is that the weather might have been warm enough here this summer that this particular tree has produced pecans for the first time we've ever noticed.

I can get plenty of YouTube videos about what to do with the pecans. I wanted to reach out and maybe find a few people who have been doing this for a long time and have any insights into harvesting and processing pecans.

Thanks in advance!

Brian
Indy

[Oak Smoke]

The pecans should drop from your tree not long after first frost. Here it’s a race to see who gets most of the pecans. It will either be me, the squirrels, or the feral pigs that raid the yard at night. Gathering pecans off the ground is easier if you rake them into a pile first. Since we have several trees we lay out old tarps or old surplus parachutes for them to fall on then lift the edge to make a pile of them. When you get your pecans there may still be part of the green husk on them. It’s easy to pick off most of the time. Next you’ll want to inspect them, looking for any small hole in them. If there’s a hole a bug has beaten you to that one and there’s no need in cracking it. There are as many pecan crackers as there are different mouse traps. A check on eBay will show you what’s out there. I like the Texas inertia nut cracker. Once you get the hang of how far to pull the rod back to make the hull fly to pieces it works great. All that leaves is taking the meat out of the broken hull. Children love doing this and will eat the nuts as fast as you can shell them.

[texastweeter]

Yep. If they fall fully in husk, they are bad. We gather probably 3 tater sacks full of them. Save the husks and use as you do wood chips to add smoke to your grill. Can you post a picture of them so mYbe we can identify species.

[mrteddyprincess]

texastweeter next time I'm over there I will send pics! (And cool suggestion with smoking with the husks!)

B

[texastweeter]

Correction, smoke with the SHELLS.

[jfmorris]

I am wondering if you haven't seen pecans before due to lack of other nearby pecan trees. Most fruit and nut trees require cross pollination with another tree of the same type. If the nearest other pecan tree is farther than a bee flies in its nectar collecting route... well, I am thinking that could impact production of fruit.

I once had a house with a mature pecan tree in the yard. Between squirrels and other critters, doubt I ever got more than a bucket of pecans for myself. I think my production was also limited due to the closest pecan tree for cross pollination being about 100 feet away, in someone else's yard.

As Oak Smoke points out, the nuts are in a tough green husk. The issue I had was that by the time they fell and the husk started opening up, they were mostly ruined.

EDIT: Seeing as you are in Indiana, I wondering if late frosts kill the blooms or buds for the nuts a lot of years?

[mrteddyprincess]

Oak Smoke and jfmorris I really appreciate the info! I'll keep you guys posted about our pecan harvest this year.

B

[RolfTaylor]

Down in LA my buddies family has a roadside stand where he will shell your nuts! So much per bushel. I guess they are a big thing down there!

[tstalafuse]

We would use one of these to pick up the pecans that had fallen by themselves.. https://www.amazon.com/COMPANY-701-P...mp;smid=A3TX4Y UK2VIRSQ You can buy a motorized version..

The next step was to spread tarps under the trees and thrash the trees with long bamboo rods to get them to release the nuts that had not fallen.. Fast Forward to about the 48 second mark... https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GNBAXhlEPIc

Keep in mind, in Texas, it is illegal to thrash trees on public property, but in practice unless you are damaging the tree no one ever says anything.