North American Fruit Explorers mailing list at ibiblio

["Stephen Sadler" <Docshiva@Docshiva.org>]

We have a cabin in the Sierra, and there is no shortage of trees producing good edible pine nuts.  Even a short drive away, or in town, or next door, one can find some trees producing edible pine nuts.  The problem is that the squirrels and chicories find them first, and have a much easier time climbing the tall trees and harvesting the nuts.  I have long been a collector of edible foods, starting when I was a wee lad on forest walks with my grandfather.  There was a time in my late teens and twenties when I would challenge myself to get by on wild edibles for a few days at a time.  In all those foraging forays, I collected maybe four pine nuts.  I think my only chance to grow them is a dwarf Siberian pine, which could be netted.  I’m a zone away from where it’s happy, but zone 8 plants seem to do fine here. 

 

Rhora’s nursery (he’s a member) http://www.nuttrees.com/ has many pine nut trees, and carries inoculants to help them grow and produce.  They have trees that have borne from seed in 5 years. 

 

Meanwhile, should any of y’all want to produce something pine nutty in a hurry, try growing pumpkins with hull-less seeds.  Is that how one would spell hull-less?  Hyphened? Two els?  Three?  The spelling of the word and the spelling of the letter ‘L’ (el and ell are both accepted) both look odd.  Maybe I just need more coffee, and less Scrabble.  Anyway, pumpkin seeds make an excellent pine nut substitute in cooking.  Not in growing, as what they grow is viney, not piney…

 

(topic police, please note that pumpkin is a fruit)

 

Stephen Sadler, Ph.D.

USDA 9, AHS heat zone 8,

Sacramento CA - Mediterranean climate

---

From: nafex-bounces@lists.ibiblio.org [mailto:nafex-bounces@lists.ibiblio.org] On Behalf Of Lon J. Rombough
Sent: Sunday, September 11, 2005 9:00 AM
To: North American Fruit Explorers
Subject: Re: [NAFEX] Grafted Pine Trees

 

"Lon J. Rombough" wrote:

Does anyone know of a source of grafted trees of Pinus edulis or P. pinea, the two pine species grown for pine nuts? I've seen them in the past, but it has been years and I can't find the nursery that sold them. I suspect there may be small, local nurseries somewhere, but a mail order source would be the best.
Seed is available of both species, but both take so long to come into bearing that a tree grafted from an old, bearing tree would have to be faster.
-Lon Rombough
Grapes, writing, consulting, my book, The Grape Grower, at http://www.bunchgrapes.com Winner of the Garden Writers Association "Best Talent in Writing" award for 2003.