Hazelnut Evaluation, 2019

Nut sizes

Every year I do a hazelnut evaluation on the nuts from each plant. The evaluation includes the size, thickness of the shell and taste. Also included in the evaluation is any interesting things about each plant such as structure of the plant, any disease or pest problems, and if the plant should be removed or pruned.

The picture about is the different sizes ranging from the larges to the smallest grown in 2019. 

This is a closer look at the different variations of the hazelnuts.

Problems in the 2019 crop.

The hazelnuts that matured later in September did not fill out, as you can see in the picture above.  The smaller nut to the left was a nut that did fill out, but it matured earlier and was picked in the middle of August .

The loss of nuts on these 5 late season maturing plants which have some of the largest nuts in the orchard was really baffling and a disappointment.

These pictures are nuts from different plants in which the nuts mature in late September and did not fill out. The kernels above on the left are another one that did not fill out, and tasted like cardboard. The kernel on the right is a full mature kernel.

On this plant the kernels were small and stuck to the top of the shell.

I brought some of these nuts into NDSU and had Greg Morgenson look at them. He told me they looked like they needed more heat units during the summer.

I found that heat units are the seasonal heat accumulation which is measured using growing degree days or GDD. A higher accumulation of GDD indicates a greater total quantity of heat during the growing season.

The nut crop was good in 2018 with a GDD of 2600, and the GDD for 2019 was just 2146, which is a  little short for recommended GDD of 2600 to 2700 for nut crops.

I originally thought it was lack of moisture, but the late spring and cool wet fall disproved that.

With the wide variety of hazelnut plants in the orchard, it was only a small loss of nuts but still a big disappointment.  This also gives me a better indication of which plants to select in the future.

I also found 6 of my new 4 and 5 year old plants with Easter Filbert Blight (EFB).

My policy is to remove the affected stems as shown above and burn them. If the plant is also producing small or inedible nuts, the whole plant will be removed.

My goal is to just select plants that are resistant to EFB.

Starting to see more weevil damage this year, and have to investigate a better way to control them, and that might be some type of spray. Right now I try to pick the nuts as early as possible and then collect the weevil under the drying racks when they bore out of the nut.

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This was another surprise when the squirrels started removing nuts on the 19th of  July, but the hot pepper spray worked good and I bought 2 more live traps. 

This is my son Bryce and grandson Orion inspecting the orchard this winter.

I'm looking forward to spring 2020.