small walnut tree

Are these black walnuts, Lorilyn? I planted one. It is very vigorous tree but no walnuts.

Yes, it is the black walnut. Your tree many be young yet. when you do get nuts be prepared for some hard work. The nuts are messy things to process and the shells are very very tough. My son decided to try tucking the nuts into the firepit. I actually got to taste a nut! it was delicious but the removal of the pulp is messy..it's about as permanent a dye as you'll find. My hands were stained for weeks!

Thanks for the warning.

I can see that it must have been "winter work" for the first settlers... it's a long process by some accounts but I think putting them in the fire is a stroke of genius. it sure beats boiling them and the attendant smell. I have seen baskets made from the sawn shells. They are extremely tough. We have a little squirrel who has laid claim to the tree at front, he sits high in the branches gnawing on them and it makes a sound akin to fingernails on a blackboard!

:-) We have 2 huge hazlenut trees, all nuts from them clamed by squirrel and Stellar Jays.

I am not familiar with the method of putting walnuts in the fire. What does it do? Do you put them in green? Or do you have to peel them first? Do they crack open?
Sorry for so many questions.

Have hazel too and like yours the nuts were claimed by birds and squirrels LOL...you should see all the stuff on the net about black walnuts! putting walnuts in the fire was a desperation move....I tried scraping all the mush and peel off of them and putting them in a huge kettle to boil...as instructed on a few web sites....the smell was awful and the nuts didn't dry fast enough and went mouldy. The thought of going through that over again had me considering removing the trees altogether. Putting the whole nut directly into the fire was my own experimentation. The nuts are layered...an outer rind encloses a layer of mushy acidic smelling pulp, which encloses the extremely hard nut shell which contains the nut meat in a dual chambered shell.
My son retrieved the nuts that I placed in the coals...rind, mush and all...the outer pulp cooked away and left the very hard nut casing somewhat charred. the cases were pulled from the fire and cracked open with a hammer and we had a taste of the meat. It was rubbery (they should be dried at that point and would have become crisp) but delicious.
The juicy pulp that encloses the nut is one of the most permanent dyes I've ever seen. The pulp is yellow in colour but the juice turns a deep bronze brown on your hands and nails. Gloves must be worn if the nuts are peeled first...one site on the net advises putting the nuts in a burlap sack and placing the sack in your driveway...driving over the nuts to peel and perhaps crack the shells! Not for me, I prefer to let the fire take care of the mess. The nuts are ready when they fall from the tree...the rind usually yellows somewhat but it is always green looking. The casing doesn't spontaneously crack open like chestnuts...it must be mined with serious tools! My son said it took several blows against a rock with a hammer! tough stuff. I'm hoping I can get a few pounds of nut meat from the hoard in the greenhouse. time will tell.

Thank you Lorilyn for your note. When I was young (hard to believe that I ever was ) my parents had a huge walnut tree in the yard but it was not Black walnut and the shell was easy to open . When they fell off the tree (they were already sort of brown) we put them in large sifter boxes, stacked them up and let them to dry for about a week and then they peeled easily.
Interestingly, my neighbour here just had her old Black walnut cut down because she could not open the shells.
I have one as well but have not seen a single nut on it yet.
I am glad you have found the way to deal with them .

Tell your neighbour to contact a rare wood dealer...her tree may be worth thousands....yes...thousands.

Lorilyn, her husband is a woodworker (hobby) so I am sure he kept it.

Black walnut wood is quite prized by veneer makers. Imagine the beauty of a solid piece construction? Did your neighbour's husband dry and mill the wood himself or take it to a sawmill? I'm considering removing one of the bw because it's trunk is already split. Lost 1/3 of the upper story in a high wind first summer we were here. thought about it again this spring but the tree seems to have healed itself and is still producing...so I put it off for another time. ...may never. remains to be seen.

What we do around here Lorilyn is to hire a portable mill.
We did that with our two huge red western cedars. They come to your property and mill it for you to your desired dimensions. Our trees were 3-4 feet in diameter, mostly dead and close to the neighbour's property and would be a real hazard to their house if they for any reason would fall down. For smaller trees we can rent smaller portable mill and do it ourselves. We have so much wood that we could almost build another house if we wanted to. My DH does not want to sell it. We cropped our young black walnut couple of times. It is the most vigorous tree I ever seen. It must like the prime location I planted it at.