To: North American Fruit Explorers <nafex@lists.ibiblio.org>
Subject: Re: [NAFEX] Fwd: Protecting the Butternut Tree
Date: Wed, 29 Jun 2005 12:17:23 -0500
At 11:13 AM 6/29/2005, Topgun wrote:
Does the Butternut tree require 2 varieties for pollination?
You know, I'm not sure.
I've got a number of butternut seedlings - some of which are quite likely
to be hybrids, as some of the seednuts came from a friend who has quite a
collection of butternut, heartnut, Carpathian, and Japanese walnut
selections, in addition to black walnut in his plantings.
True butternut and Japanese walnut/heartnut cross-pollenate readily. I
suppose that if bloom periods overlap/coincide, Carpathian &/or black could
also cross-pollenate, but I'm only aware of a couple of butternutXblack
walnut hybrids, and a single buartXblack cross, so it may be that their
bloom periods are not compatible for hybridization to occur frequently
without some human intervention.
One of my butternut seedlings, grown from seednuts from GA produced catkins
for the first time this year, but no nutlet flowers, so no nuts yet. These
'Southern' nuts were quite different from the 'northern' butternuts I was
more accustomed to seeing - a smaller, more rounded, egg-shaped nut, with
less prominent external ridges/veins on the shell itself, but internal nut
structure and characteristics of the seedling are undoubtedly 'butternut'.
Lucky Pittman
USDA Cold Zone 6
AHS Heat Zone 7
Hopkinsville, KY