Last year the hickory nuts blanketed the ground about now-

I want to know if I am losing it. Last year the hickory nuts were literally blanketing the ground over here and it started the beginning of October. Come to think of it the acorns were too. The fruits were so heavy in October and early November that the squirrels and chipmunks were in a frenzy running about frantically destroying everything I had planted for the year trying to bury their nuts.

In the beginning of September, I noticed a few hickory nuts falling and didn't think much of it other than that it seemed a little early for them to start dropping but I did make a mental note to myself to gather a few to send to somebody. The last few weekends it rained so I wasn't outside much at all. I take my baggie tonight after work and I go out to collect hickory nuts and we're talking zip nadda nothing zilch. About all I can see on the ground is last year's outer husks.

I know that oak fruit production tends to be cyclical in that some years there is a bumper crop to the extent that the acorns are putting dents in our cars and then other years the trees are done fruiting in the blink of an eye but I'd never actually paid attention to my hickories. Are hickories cyclical too?

I've found a few nuts but we're talking only a handful and all of them have hickory shuckworm. I went up north to a girlfriend's house and checked out her tree and she doesn't have anything. Is it possible that the hickory shuckworm wiped me out in one fell swoop, or were the critters a tad bit overzealous this year and I didn't even notice, or am I experiencing masting of my hickories?

I look up in the trees and I don't see any nuts up there. Where did they go? Has anyone else noticed this?

Yes, they mast just like oaks, but not always in the same years, and not always with such perfect synchrony. The shuckworms won't hurt the nut any, so unless you have nut weevils go ahead and use the ones you did find.

Guy S.

Is this happening to you this year? All of the hickories are doing this from my house on up over the border into Wisconsin.

I know the shuckworms don't do major damage but I don't want to send them out of state.

Hmmm, I think that the harvest is a bit early this year. The Shagbarks have been dropping nuts for about three weeks here in S.E. Michigan, and I am going out tomorow to gather more from a grove of them in the school yard across the street from my house. There are several massive Oaks in my neighborhood that are dropping lots of acorns right now. I have been picking up as many as my pockets will hold while I am walking the dogs. Today I found a few acorns under a large Burr Oak, Q. macrocarpa. Their acorns are the most interesting looking ones of the acorns I have gathered so far, with the heavy scales above the cap nearly encasing the nut. I am going back with a big baggy in the morning to gather more of them. Sadly, the squirrls have also been gathering them, so there aren't as many whole ones left as I'd like. Still, I hope to thraught the efforts of squirrls and steal away with as many as is possible. There are many large stands of different kinds of Oaks in this neighborhood, having been a large forest and swamp land 40 years ago when people started building here, one house at a time. Many of the really big Oaks still stand, along with mature Shagbark Hickeries, a few Beech (their seeds are realy unusual), and many sugar Maples. So I will be gathering every day for a while. This new Oak field guild from the USDA has been very helpfull and I am trying to pick leaves to go with the nuts I am gathering. Fun. Equal did you get my email?

Yes, everything is dropping and coloring up early this year. I took a look at the soybeans and they are dropping their leaves already which is darn near 3 weeks premature if memory serves me and it doesn't all that well these days. I e-mailed you back to your main e-mail account. Do me a favor will you. Would you please send a few Shagbark nuts along to me with the Fagus and the Pignut if you can grab any. Incredibly, I need to send them on to somebody else otherwise I'm going to be out there with a shop vac sucking around the bases of my trees looking for crumbs

I think I need to do a little checking on this.

Sure, I'll be glad to, if I can get enough. So far, the squirrls have been getting most of the Shagbarks too, but I know where there are two good stands so I will probably get lucky. One thing I did notice, Or I am loosing my mind. Guy, no comment please :) The Shagbark nuts seem smaller than usual this year. I hope they are viable. I am trying to introduce them into my Ditch and have been planting them for three years with no success yet. I am having some success with the Oaks though. So Far I have 6 seedling Oaks that have come up, 5 Q. Alba and 1 Chinkapin oak. Yippy!
You are going to love the pignuts. I got you a bag full! I hope you can get them to grow. They are such special trees. I am encouraging them on my property. They grow about 40 feet tall and remain narrow. The Leaves are dark green and very luxurious. They are cute little seedlings too.

Darn. Somebody here said the pignut hiclory nuts are so bitter that even the squirrels don't like them, so I tossed mine out. (I was going to try to root them.) I'll see if I can find more. I've had a bumper crop of beech nuts. Acorns are scarce here because most of the oaks have been dying from Bacterial Leaf Scorch.

I have literally thousands of acorns this year and don't remember ever having them like this. I didn't know that some years were more than others.

That's exactly what I had last year with the Hickories. We're talking thousands of nuts last year.

Here's a link I found that might be of interest to you-
http://usclancaster.sc.edu/faculty/scarlett/acrnsmry.htm

Interesting article...I didn't even know (never heard of) masting.

NotGreenjeans, maybe they were talking about bitternut (Carya cordiformis)? Pignut (C. glabra) is not the sweetest nut in the genus, but definitely edible.

Evil, if you find a few good nuts, just husk them before sending them, and put the husks out by the bird feeder. Then your chickadees and nuthatches will benefit from the husk worms! If you have enough of the husks, they also make a good walking surface over the inevitable mud that forms under bird feeders. But don't use them as mulch because you might be introducing some allelopathy.

My own observations and readings lead me to believe that masting results from a combination of pollination weather and the previous crop yield. Oak and hickory trees seldom have bumper crops in successive years, and all of them in a region react to poor pollination weather by producing meager yields that year (or the following year, for 2-year maturation species). It serves them well by subjecting the seed parasites to feast/famine conditions and keeping them from building up population levels.

Patrick, if you still have some of that "mind" left (!), be sure to store your harvest in zip-locks in the fridge. If they dry out or heat up they will lose viability. Cool storage also slows the seed maggots/weevils metabolism and encourages them to exit the seed and head for low ground. In doing so, they will burrow through the plastic bag and head for whatever is in the bottom of the fridge, so place the bags in a metal or tuperware bowl to contain everything. (Or just let them go on down, if you want to hear some frantic shrieks from the wife when she pulls the lettuce out of the vegetable bin! Hee-hee-hee!!!!!!)

Guy S.

Patrick3852: You made me homesick with your discription of those Michigan forest nut trees. I grew up in a rural area near Traverse City not far from the Manistee River. We tapped Sugar Maples when I was a kid. Ive not been back in 30 years. Strange how those happenings with the trees in the fall just stay in your bones forever. I dont remember a human face from those times, but I do remember the oaks, maples, juneberries (amalancier), beeches, and virgin pines. And the birches also, with their papery bark and yellow leaves in the fall.

Thanks Guy, I do store seeds in plastic bags inmy frig. I have several of those plastic boxes that Candy cones i that are perfect for sticking the baggies in so the lettuce drawer need not fear intrusion. However, that does sound like a great gag to play on someone.
Hey Equil, Guy says you should put that baggy of nuts I'm sending you in your salad drawer! HEHE

Anyway, I'm off for the Dog walk with an assortment of bags and I'm wearing a pair of Dockers with tons of big pockets. Hmmmm. All this extra weight could get em-barr-ass-ing. Maybe I should wear suspenders!

Its really a beautiful fall like day, for a change. Sunny and crisp! Hey Gloria, Get yourself up here in early October. You know there is no better place than Michigan in the fall...

Hey Patrick, I have a whole full size refrigerator dedicated to my habit. My husband wanted my "stuff" out of our refrigerator in the kitchen so he bought me a refrigerator for the garage. Mine mine mine! I didn't have a problem with migrating critters but he did.

I can't find "masting" in garden terms....what does it actually mean? dropping of nuts????

If you were a rubber stamper you'd know what Masting means...
OOPPPS! that's Masking, sorry :)

This message was edited Sep 21, 2006 12:01 PM

levilyla, Try your search in Garden Terms again.

Better yet,

http://davesgarden.com/terms/go/3258

I can go in and edit it when others speak up.

levilyla: "mast" refers to the nuts produced by forest trees. Acorns, beechnuts, hickories, etc. The mast crop refers to the nuts available as food for those animals who normally eat the nuts. If the nuts are in short supply, it can limit animal populations. Prehistorically, mast crops were important to human populations also. Annual variability was a topic of much concern, because it determined how the society would deal with the up-coming winter. When mast crops were plentiful, huge groups could gather for collection of the nuts. It was a time of great celebration and a chance to see old friends. Party!. Party!. When mast crops were not plentiful, groups may have to disperse into fall family units in order to survive for the winter. So, the cyclic nature of the mast crops had profound effects on human populations, as well as on animals. This is an anthropological explanation--as opposed to what you are getting from these tree-nut people.

Wildlife sometimes get picky like we do, but they will eat what nature intended if they have to. It's sort of like having a choice between bologna sandwich and a turkey sub. I'd rather have the turkey, but if I'm starving I'll eat the bologna. My water oak acorns are supposed to be bitter, the squirrels aren't even touching them right now because they have so many pecans to eat this year. If the pecans weren't there I guarantee they would be eating those acorns.

Gloria thank you for your explanation (I like the anthropological one). As opposed to these nutty tree people. Equil...thanks for posting and thanks to escam. for the info. Now I can say "look at this masting of my white oaks!" Correct?

Tree Nut: Now what I said was 'tree-nut people' not 'nutty tree people'. But if the shoe fits . . ..

welllllll...they are sort of nutty but very nicey

OOOOOOO So masting is the actual holding back of fruiting. I think I am missing this. LOL IQ a little on the low side.

No, not exactly. If your trees "hold back" fruiting next year after having produced a bumper crop the previous year, you would be able to refer to your trees as masting.

Gloria gave you a very good definition of mast. I gave you the definition of masting. Two different words.

IQ definitely not on the low side for you, it's a new concept to you.

Think about what Guy typed above, 'It serves them well by subjecting the seed parasites to feast/famine conditions and keeping them from building up population levels."

Now think about what escambiaguy typed above, "My water oak acorns are supposed to be bitter, the squirrels aren't even touching them right now because they have so many pecans to eat this year. If the pecans weren't there I guarantee they would be eating those acorns."

Those two actually do play into the equation. Populations of shuckworms are being kept in check for me right now and the critters are eating less tasty "mast" right now which gives other species of mast a chance. Think reproductive strategy with each native species contributing to the suvival and perpetuation of the other native species in my plant community. Next year I will have baby oaklings popping up all over the place and the shuckworms will be kept at bay because of the "masting" of my hickories. Very complex relationships at play.

Thank you Equil. You have been very patient with me. :~) I'm glad SP is away ....

Incredibly, the shuckworms play into the equation too. There are critters that depend on those for survival.

I miss SP, I know you do too.

Equil: Masting is a new term to me also, as opposed to 'the mast crop'. Do you mean it refers to the sum total of ecological processes concerned with the cyclic interval of nut-tree production. It would include all the nuts produced for the cycle and the differential use of them by all critters, large and small. ???

I think you're coming in close. To me, it appears to be a sum total of many events where in which abiotic and biotic disturbances come into play resulting in boom or bust. Species specific seed production can benefit from the process. It's all about survival and in my opinion, succession. Bottom line is that some acorns and nuts have to survive predation to become seedlings while fauna populations have to be kept in check to enable some of the seedlings to reach maturity. One of the reasons why the disproportionately high numbers of deer out there are taking such a toll on our ecosystems. I suspect leaf litter is even going to come in to play here and introduced earthworms are most assuredly contributing to the disruption of these processes. I've just read that asynchronimity plays in to the equation. Interesting.

I have to go to work but do me a favor and see if you can do a google search on leaf litter and masting and see if there is anything out there. Just a gut feeling there might be some research out there already for all of us to read. I'll go and do a search later on this evening for other goodies but I'm sort of tired and sort of feeing not all that great.

I thought earth worms were good....hope you feel better.

levilyla
Earthworms are good, I suppose, in a garden or lawn setting, but the earthworms most folks are acquainted with are introduced species, and it appears that they are having a detrimental effect on forest soil ecology.

Here's some more info:
http://www.nrri.umn.edu/worms/default.htm
http://www.bbg.org/gar2/topics/essays/2004su_worms.html

Equil: Hope you feel better. Everyone I know thinks they have eaten spinach!

I did a quick Google search. It seems that the effect of leaf litter on masting is a very hot thesis topic recently. The thesis I scanned was Wenyao Liu's study of nutrient cycling in the Ailao Mountain area of SW China. It is an Oak/Chestnut forest with underlayers of bamboo and fern. According to the abstract, he finds that this type of forest produces a heavy accumulation of litter, but no storage. It is at: adt.curtin.edu.au/theses. This was only one of many on leaf littler/nutrient cycling.

asynchronimity - nonconcurrent cycles of different nut species?

You all have completely lost me!

levilyla: Im sure Equil will explain this. As I understand, masting is a complexity of many, many variables. Even 1 thing, such as the earthworms overpopulating, can destroy seedling crops, hence limit trees that would have provided nuts to keep the whole system running. Hence, the photo above of dead trees caused by worms. Everything is interconnected in a system. It is a way of understanding complexity, which is what you want to do, instead of reducing the whole thing to simplist terms. That would be--throwing the baby out with the bathwater as they say. Im sure the tree-nuts will be back later and make everything clear to us.

Here is another study on masting: It is at www.esajournals.org, so only the abstract is available. It was published in Ecology, vol 83, No 5 pp 1214-1225. Title: Masting by Eighteen New Zealand Plant Species: The Role of Temperature as a Synchronizing Cue. E.M. Schauber, et al. Dept. of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, U. of Connecticut. According to the abstract, La Nina phase temperatures triggered intergeneric synchrony among the 18 species discussed.

Don't be so sure, Equil is sick and Equil needs to get off of this computer and get out of this house to meet up with relatives or E will be in deep do do. Good detective work gloria125! I know the links you found will be great links, I'll read them over the weekend but right now I have got to go.