Oh, man. I miss living in pecan country. Probably the easiest nut to harvest and process. If I had acres of land, I might give some of the lower heat varieties a go. But then I probably wouldn’t have the urban heat island benefit, either.
I suppose I could always guerilla plant a few in some parks…
One answer is to plant and then blacktop a large circle/rectangle over what will be their large root zone. So a 40’-60’ circle. THIS works!
The two varieties recommended for the NE are: Mullahy and NC-4
Pecan author Wes Rice is recommending them and they have already proven in CT. zone 6 and w/o blacktop.
Dax
Hmmm… maybe in some municipal parking lots?
sure!
If anyone asks about suspicious pecan trees in Nashua, you heard nothing!
fingers crossed behind my back
Sargent Schultz “I see noooothing. I see nottthhhingggg”
I show Iowa, Lucas, Warren 346, and NC4 as most likely to produce in extreme northern locations.
Charlie Paradise, in Acton, MA has had at least a couple of pecans bearing nuts there for quite a few years. IIRC, they were seedlings, but IDK what their lineage was.
Mullahy is bi-annual but NC4 really churns em out every year in 6b CT.
Last year my cousin and I had rotten pecans. What could have caused this?
There are multiple reasons pecans can be bad. One is because the trees were infected by scab. Another is from stinkbug feeding. A third is from aphid damage to the leaves. If you need a fourth, it is because pecan weevils and shuckworms are feeding on or in the nuts.
Acton is quite close to me… In fact, I might have a better environment between lower elevation and the urban heat.
On another note, when I lived in Arkansas, I found one lone pecan nut, far from any tree, that was probably 2"-2 1/2" long and had a shell that I could peel like paper. It was on the edge of a parking lot. Never found another one, and I’m not sure if it was dropped by a squirrel or a person who had come from an orchard. Are there any named varieties that match that description,
Mahan.
It’s what I envision when people talk about ‘papershell’ pecans.
Looks about right. I remember the shell being oddly shaped and the kernel having a bit of a taper, just like the pics of Mahan I found just now. So it probably came from somewhere else on someone’s pickup, as most of the trees in town were seedlings as far as I know.
Mahan is one of those pecans that really disappoints once it gets past about 20 years old. It tends to severely overbear with many clusters of 6 nuts - far more than a tree can support properly. It is double protogynous and since protogyny is dominant, all of Mahan’s offspring are protogynous. Mahan is commonly thought to be a selfed seedling of Schley though I have not seen DNA proof of this. If this is correct, then Schley is the ancestor of roughly 2/3 of the pecan varieties being planted today. From a genetic perspective, we have a lot of “nuts” in one basket.
Yeah, I don’t remember the flavor being anything special, either. I think most of the seedling trees tasted better. But it was neat to see a nut that I could just peel.
Was there ever a conclusion to Pecans in zone 4? I Skimmed through and found a recommendation for Iowa, warren 346, and Green island beaver.
I’m in Eastern South Dakota, north of Sioux Falls about 45 minutes. I’m just want to plant a few trees, so I’m looking to purchase some already grafted trees yet this year.
Just trying to see if there was some first hand success with it this far north.
I’m south of sioux falls and I planted warren346 and nc4 last winter they froze down to the graft. Both sprouted below the graft this spring, one with a shoot above the graft. Ill prune them and try making them work, but wouldn’t advise planting any. I could have just been unlucky with mine but can’t justify spending more money on something that could just freeze off. They’re a bit pricey for a decent sized one. I bought more shagbarks for this spring hopefully they are close enough to having pecans?
Any idea how many cooling degree days & heating degree days you have? I see you get at least 160 frost free days when set to 28F for your annual average. That’s not bad!
Pecans need summer rainfall or irrigation. No summer rain and no way to water is a place not to grow pecans. I don’t know much about your part of the country.
I’ve tried to plug in different cities 40-60 miles north of Sioux Falls to get their heating and cooling degree days but I haven’t found a website that is worth a shot yet.