[Magdalen] Another "worthless" food.

[Sibyl Smirl]

On 9/30/16 10:48 AM, Jay Weigel wrote:
> It's not that simple. First of all, they're all over the damn place.
> Second, harvesting them is a LOT of work for what you get. You have to not
> only gather them, but hull them, which is a very thankless task, and then
> pick them out of the hulls, which takes HOURS. Your return is pretty small
> for all that. No thanks. And besides all that, I absolutely hate the taste
> of them, so I wouldn't bother.
>
> Nice check in the mail? Don't make me laugh.

I got several hundred dollars from some black walnut trees in a pasture. 
  Don't have any yard trees.  The pasture trees had been yard trees for 
a long-gone homestead place.  Couldn't tell you how to find the people 
who'd give you that deal, though: it was an individual entrepreneur 
woodworker neighbor of my ex-husband's.  There were plenty left that 
were not the quality which would pass his inspection, that still 
produced plenty of nuts.  I later sold the land, though.

There's an outfit called "Hammons Hullers" which will give you a check 
for a pick-up load or even just a few bucketfuls of nuts, effort 
involved just picking them up off the ground, tossing into buckets or 
the pickup itself, and transporting them to the huller.  Lots of farm 
kids around here do that every autumn when the ad from the hullers goes 
into the paper.  Me, I like the nuts, so I never sold any I had access 
to.  You hull them yourself by spreading them in your driveway and 
running over them with your car as you go in and out, stirring them 
occasionally with a rake, and picking up the ones that are "finished" to 
the hard shell.  Then you break the shells with a hammer on something 
paved.  You do get your hands well stained from handling them, but I 
suppose if you cared about that you could wear gloves.  Yeah, it's 
"stoop labor", but that's also good exercise, and more pleasant than 
calisthenics.


-- 
Sibyl Smirl
I will take no bull from your house!  Psalms 50:9a
mailto:polycarpa3 at ckt.net