Nuts!

[carl_allery]

This year I meant to sort out the bottom end of the garden with compost heaps and reinforced fence etc but, as usual, it hasn't happened. So, the area under my nut tree is a bit of a bramble wilderness and spider-web haven. This does not inspire me to venture into it but, the nut tree - as is the way of such things - does not care and is dropping

Comments

[julesjones]

Crack a few and check that there's something in them. Father-in-law has a fine cobnut tree, and every single one of the fallen nuts a couple of weeks ago was an empty shell. Possibly because they'd already been squirrel-tested for having contents, and discarded as unworthy of the effort of opening them...

[carl_allery]

Oh yes, they've all had nice fat juicy nuts in. :) We have a fairly dense cat population round here which helps. I picked some green nuts the other week - those I could reach and they were all full as well. Now they're just dropping by themselves. *g*

[heleninwales]

Oh, you are lucky! Our hazel is happily producing nuts, but last year all the ones I collected were empty. I've only tried two so far from this year, but they were empty too. :(

However, I did collect some wonderful nuts one year from some trees in a village not very far from here, so I don't know whether it's climate or type of tree or what.

[carl_allery]

I had a quick google and it seems that it could be due to nut weevil - in which case there should be a hole in the shell - or just failure of pollination, which seems more likely if all the shells are empty. Since they're wind-pollinated, if the trees that were pollinating them are no longer there or have suffered from frost or some disease, then it seems the nut will still form, there'll just be nothing inside. :(

[green_knight]

Nice picture of the bottom of your garden. Clearly _something mysterious_ lurks there...

[carl_allery]

LOL, there is in fact a spider-infested garden shed lurking underneath that tree! And beyond the holly on the left (currently loaded with berries) is another 3 fence panels ( = 20 ft) of garden that I really should be making more of!