Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Gunsmithing Planting saplings for gun stocks

Back years ago some piker came along and offered to cut trash trees, box elder, chinaberry, hackberry and such out of the creek on my Grandads farm. He'd pay for the privilege and was selling it for making pallets or something or so he said. Turned out that 4" diameter hackberry looks just like 40" diameter black walnuts or that's what we figured by the stumps out there after the joker was long gone.

Understandable why you refer to him as "late."

Justifiable, all the way!

I don't know if you guys are guessing, or have actual knowledge.

I, too, planted a bunch of black walnuts in 1984. I can't get my arms around them now. I have the 3 biggest, nicest ones picked out to cut down, and mill into 4" slabs this winter.

If I get 3 nice slabs out of the three trees, I'll be tickled. 33 years ago, when I planted them, I hoped for a couple nice gun stocks when I got to retirement age.

I'm there now...and so are they.

By all means, PLANT THEM!

As a matter of fact, right now I have close to 50 walnuts in planters, and more in the refrigerator going thru the 3 month hibernation period, before I plant them also. I'll never be around to reap the benefits of their beautiful wood, but someone else will.

Do you know when the best time is to plant a tree?









20 years ago.

A walnut tree that grew that fast is likely going to have widely spaced annular rings which translates into merely average lumber for things of beauty, such as gun stocks and fine furniture. I hope you prove me wrong, but I'll still bet against it. The best (stable and strong) lumber is old growth stuff with tight annular rings- true for any species (including humans).

There was a walnut tree growing in the backyard of my great-grandfather's farmstead in north central PA. Somewhere there's a picture dated 1963 of my ten year old self, my dad, and great-gramps trying to touch hands around the circumference of that tree- and failing by a wide margin. Upon the old man's death, my uncle bought the place and, you guessed it, sold the tree. My dad and grandfather were livid. Uncle Bill gave my dad some chunks of the tree as a peace offering, but he spit back that it was limb wood and not worth the effort to dry and make something of and that was why the sawyer left them behind. That was my first lesson in woodworking. (I still have some odd pieces of that wood from which I make small items like powder horn end caps, wedges for through tenons and the like- little heirloom touches.) That tree was a big tree at the turn of the century when great-gramps bought the place- it looms in the background in an old pic of my great-grandmother posing her pregnant self in the backyard two months before Grampa was born in '03. That old bugger was probably a seedling during the Revolutionary War.

You are probably right, and I've thought about that before I decided to cut a few down this winter. I think there are 22 of them that are big enough to fart around with.

I just think it's cool that I can harvest a walnut tree, that I personally planted over 30 years ago, and make something out of it. Even if it's a crappy rifle stock. I might just get lucky! I do alot of wood working projects in the shop during the winter, and have lots of ideas for these walnut trees.

Neat story about that giant old walnut tree.

Yeah - figure 50+ for black walnut...

Okay, let's do some guessing with math...

Assuming you are a 6' male your arms spread about 6' tip to tip. It is hard to get your arms around a tree and keep it tight the whole way around, but it is safe to say you trees are not likely to be more than 6' in circumference.

Divide by pi and you get less than 2' of diameter.

Walnut bark is quite thick... suddenly your log is 22" in diameter.

Sapwood on walnut is extremely variable, even within a given area, but at least 1.5" will be sap. 4" of sap is not uncommon.

Suddenly the usable log is down to 19" in diameter, still looking good... unless you have 4" of sap in which case you are down to 14".

The center in walnuts is a chambered pith (hollow) about 1/4" or less.

But the wood around the pith is "juvenile wood" and very different from sound walnut (true with virtually all species, not just walnut) and not usable in a blank. At least 2" from center... limb wood is another example of juvenile wood and the reason it will not be used for stock wood.

Suddenly your log has a 4" diameter "hole" down the center.

All of a sudden you do not have a quartersawn blank option at all.


But the bigger thing about older trees is related to many other, very important aspects. Figure such as curly does not start near the center, but rather well to the outside. A 30-year-old walnut is not at all likely to have curly figure... a 200 year old tree is... Older wood also develops "depth" when much of the opaque cell structures go away leaving the wood with tremendous translucence. This alone will greatly increase the value of a blank. With English walnut more than black there is also black line disease, which produces "marbling" in the wood... another huge value booster. Depth and marbling together can push a piece through the roof. Depth and/or marbling will not be found in a 30 year old tree.

Then there is the issue of drying the wood... stock makers do not want kiln-dried wood and few will use a blank less than 10 years dry.

Now, on a positive note, the best blanks will come from the stump. Usually two-piecers is all they cut there, but if you cut high you may get rifle blanks from the stump.

Spot on... Good post, SD...

I know as a 13 year old 20+ years ago I picked up enough black walnuts and sold at $10/100 weight to buy my first gun, a 700 ADL .270. $300 at the local K-Mart. BDL was $330 and I didn't have the coin.

$300 is a lot of walnuts by the way.

the "individual" high-priced walnut logs come out of such states as illinois, indiana & kentucky.

further south we can grow black walnuts just fine for nuts, and for size of the trees. they grow fast enough. but the soil conditions are different, and so the wood and the appearance of the wood does not measure up to illinois black walnuts. and the further west toward texas, the worse it gets. oh, it'll still be black walnut, true enough. but the price will be different.

lot's of trees behind mom & dad's old homeplace are near worthless. how come? because of all the metal that has been put into the trees over the years.....clothes lines, horseshoes, nails galore, and all kinds of other stuff.

Are your fingers still black?

Weather can have a big influence on timber quality. As my other post, we live in a transitional area. Wild Cherry, grown right here, is low quality. 50 miles north or 25 miles west, on the plateau, quality is good.

Except that most western states, especially Oregon, California, Idaho, and PA produce better black walnut... even KY, Missouri, and LA produce some very nice walnut...

Yard trees are not worth much, but metal detectors make them reasonable to cut...

yep, and tennessee and west virginia. never heard of much coming out of La. and further west other than volume.

We had quite a few Black Walnut trees on our land in SW PA in the 50's.We would pick up the walnuts with husks on after the1st frost. Dad put the snow tires on the car and jacked the rear drive wheel up just a tad to get it off the ground and put a back board about 6 ft away. He would chock the other wheels, put the transmission in low and let the car idle. We would toss the walnuts with the husk on under the wheel and it would shred the husk off.We would then put the walnuts up on the shed roof to dry for about a month or two. We always had Black Walnut Fudge for Christmas. Winter days were spent cracking walnuts on a piece of railroad iron with a ball peen hammer and eating them.

You could always tell the farm kids at school during the fall.They had the black hands.
I still have some of the walnut lumber my brother cut and had up in his barn for 20 years. It is not real figured,but has mad some decent stocks.

I would plant Black Walnuts and then graft thin shelled English onto them. Better nuts and better wood for someone. I am a compulsive tree planter and planted more than a thousand or so. Someone will benefit from them. Never a bad idea to plant trees. Maple may have some potential as even straight grained can be spalted and made more valuable. They grow faster too.

Deer and Bear love the walnuts so you can hunt under them while your waiting.

"A man has come to terms with life when he is willing to plant trees under whose shade he will never sit."