Walnutis a relatively popular species in our country. It is not difficult to grow, and its fruits are not only tasty but also very he althy. It is worth having at least one walnut in your garden, but be careful, because this tree can grow heavily. Find out more about planting andwalnut cultivationand choose a variety suitable for your garden.
Walnut - fruit
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Walnut(Juglans regia) belongs to the walnut family (Juglandaceae).It is a large tree that can grow up to 20 m tall, although in gardens it usually grows half the size. The bark on the trunk is smooth, gray-gray. The leaves are large and pinnate, composed of smaller leaflets, the top leaf being the largest. The fruit is spherical, with a smooth green skin that cracks when ripe to reveal a light brown walnut shell with an edible interior at the center. It is worth knowing that the inside of the fruitwalnutconsists of 2 large, thick and oily cotyledons and they are so eagerly eaten by us. Nuts ripen in October. Newly planted plants, depending on the growing conditions and the selected variety, start fruiting 2 - 4 years after planting.
Walnut - varieties
There are many varieties of walnuts. We can distinguish late and early varieties, as well as those with larger or smaller fruits.Walnut varietiesalso differ in growth strength.It is also worth knowing that trees that reach smaller sizes are obtained by grafting. Therefore, seedlings obtained by grafting are most often chosen for home or allotment gardens. Here are the most famousvarieties of walnut :
Walnut Leopold- this is a Polish variety with very poor growth, so it can be planted in smaller gardens. It belongs to the group of medium-early varieties. The tree is disease resistant. It bears fruit in the second year after planting. The fruits are medium-sized, tasty.Apollo walnut- a variety of medium growth, of Czech origin, bears fruit in the third year after planting, the fruit is medium-sized.
Walnut Jupiter- Polish variety, medium-late, medium growth, bears fruit in the third year after planting, the fruit is tasty, slightly egg-shaped.
Koszycki walnut- another Polish variety, the fruit is tasty, the growth is weak and spherical, so it is suitable for small gardens, interestingly, the flowers of this variety of walnut are resistant to frost a spring tree that is resistant to diseases, it bears fruit in the second year after planting.
Walnut Red cherry- very late variety with strong growth, the fruit is very large (almost like a tennis ball!), The flesh is pinkish (hence the name - red), not very suitable for drying, it is best to eat it fresh, it bears fruit in the third year after planting, it generally develops he althy, it is resistant to diseases.
Walnut Early milky- Polish variety, very early, medium and spherical growth, large fruit, best eaten fresh, flowers are resistant to spring frosts, the tree develops he althily.
Walnut - cultivation, requirements
Walnut cultivationsucceeds best in deep, fertile and fresh soils, preferably calcareous. Waterlogged, too heavy and compact soils are unsuitable.Walnutprefers sunny and warm locations. The best exhibitions for him are the west, south-west and north-west. It is quite frost-resistant and can be grown all over the country.Even if it freezes from time to time, it has a great ability to regenerate damage after severe winters. Walnut trees, on the other hand, are often damaged by late May frosts, which cause the death and blackening of delicate, developing flower buds.
Walnut - planting
Beforeplanting a walnutit is worth preparing the substrate on which the tree will grow a year in advance. Above all, you should regularly weed the area under the walnut. Then the soil should be dug deep. The deeper the better (remember that the nut burns the root system). It is also very important to fertilize the soil with well-decomposed manure or compost. Fertilization has to be more intensive if the soil is poor and sandy. In the case of acidic soils, it is also worth adding a dose of calcium fertilizer, which will give the soil an appropriate pH and fight the unfavorable acidic reaction.Walnut cultivationworks best in soil with a pH of 6.5 - 7.5.
Walnut - fruit ripening on the tree
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There are twodates for planting walnuts- in the fall or early spring, when the buds and the whole tree are dormant. Autumn planting in October and November seems to produce the best results. However, it is associated with the risk of freezing of the young tree, so after planting around the shoot, a mound of earth should be made, which can be additionally warmed with leaves, compost or coniferous twigs. The mound should be high enough to protect the vaccination site. The deadline for the springplanting of the walnutallows you to avoid the winter frosts that are dangerous for young trees, but the vegetation of the walnut planted in spring starts a little later. Often, when spring is too dry, the trees may become weak or even become ill. Therefore, nuts planted in spring need to be watered regularly in the first few months.Finally,the planting date for walnutdepends on the area in which you live and the exposure to winter frosts and the possibility of regular watering in spring.In spring, in the second half of May, the first cut should be made newly planted nut trees. The task of the first cuts is to properly form the crown of the walnut.
Walnut - cut
Walnut pruningis important especially for newly planted trees (especially those propagated by grafting) and to form the crown of the tree properly. It should not be lower than 1.5 m. In uncut nuts, left alone, the crown is often too low. It is also necessary to remove shoots growing from the rootstock, below the place of grafting. Old nuts are cut mainly to overexpose their crowns and to trim trees that are already too large. It is worth remembering thatwalnut cuttingis not worth postponing for the next years, because wounds after cutting too thick branches heal hard. Walnutis best suited for cutting shoots, the diameter of which does not exceed 5 cm.
Uncut walnut grows huge
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The correctcutting date for the walnut is very important , as this plant is easily cut at the wrong date and is susceptible to diseases. Unfortunately, there are manydoubts about the choice of the walnut cutting dateUsually it is recommended to cut walnuts at the end of winter or early spring, when the risk of severe frost has passed but the plants have not yet started growing (February-March) . Unfortunately, at this time, a lot of sap often leaks from the wounds, which weakens the tree and makes the cutting wounds heal for a long time. Leaking juice basically makes it impossible to protect wounds with garden ointment.
Anotherrecommended cutting date for walnuts is the period from mid-May to early June , when the young growths already reach a length of 5 cm.At this time, the sap in the tree is circulating so slowly that no significant leakage is observed. For this reason, this term of cutting the nut is recommended more and more often.
Unfortunately, this term also has some disadvantages. In late spring, numerous pathogens develop intensively - diseases and pests that can attack walnut trees. This makes cutting at this later date also risky.
How do I get out of this dilemma?I personally trim walnuts in March. However, I choose a day when the tree sap does not leakI am not sure what it results from, but one day you see a leak of juices, and others you do not. So I test one branch and see if any juice is leaking. If the juices are leaking out intensively, I postpone the cut to another day. If the test shows that no juice is leaking on a given day, it is safe to prune the tree.
For cutting walnuts, choose a warm and sunny day , without rainfall. Cover the cut wounds with garden ointment with fungicide.
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