The New Student's Reference Work/Walnut

Wal′nut, species of Juglans, and native of the temperate regions of the northern hemisphere. They are fine forest-trees, and also yield most valuable timber. The nuts of various species are well-known. The English walnut is J. regia, and is the common walnut of commerce. Its commercial culture in this country is practically confined to California, though it is grown in widely scattered portions of the country. Nut-culture in California has become a very important industry, walnut orchards a feature of the state. They are found along the coast and in the interior valleys. Hardy varieties are grown up into southern Oregon. Nuts are shaken from the trees, spread out in trays to dry, and bleached before shipping. Much damage has been done by a bacterial blight of the nut, in battling with which spraying with Bordeaux mixture is employed. The common black walnut of the United States is J. nigra, well known for its fine, dark timber as well as for its characteristic nuts. The tree is distributed generally in this country, but is not very common in the eastern states, being more familiar in rich lands of the Mississippi Basin. It is of slow growth, attains a height of 100 feet, and with its towering and great trunk presents a massive and splendid appearance. The bark is rough and blackish, foliage a light yellowish-green, from 13 to 23 leaflets growing on a stalk. The leaves come late and fall early, and the tree is further deprived of its foliage by the ravaging of countless fall web-worms. The round, black, sharply-furrowed nuts are of excellent flavor. They are encased in a greenish-yellow husk. The wood is heavy, strong and close-grained, and has been so greatly in demand for furniture, interior finish and gunstocks, that the tree is scarcely to be counted longer as a forest tree. The butternut or white walnut is J. cinerea, ranging from New England southward to Georgia and westward. It grows from 30 to 50 to 100 feet, has spreading horizontal branches; the bark is grayish, stalks sticky, leaflets oval, sessile. In the scarce foliage there is much of yellow. The wood is light brown, takes a high polish, and is used for furniture and interior finish. The rough, brown, oblong nut, pointed at one end, has a sweet, oily kernel.