by David McGinness

The most unique aspect of my business is that the product you receive can be traced back to a particular tree from the family farm where I was raised in the 1960s. My father purchased the farm in 1957, and at that time the walnut trees were already several hundreds of years old.

On this property is a tree we refer to as “The Grandfather Tree.” Estimated to be approximately 350 years old, this tree would have been a sapling in 1670. It was already 100 years old at the time of the American Revolution. American Indians would have camped here, and the only Europeans who might have passed by it would have been fur trappers. At the time of the Civil War, it was approaching 200 years old.

American Black Walnut trees normally do not live much longer than 200 years, however, this tree and its grove of children are in a deep narrow valley protected from the wind and are fed by a constant supply of water.

The Grandfather Tree has a trunk that is 38 inches wide (wider than a yardstick), with a total height of 110 feet. In a good year, it will drop over 2,000 walnuts, most of which will be eaten by squirrels. Some turn into its children, which will continue to grow for generations to come.

how American Black Walnut trees grow

American Black Walnut trees grow very slowly. This gives them very tight grain patterns which result in the beauty and character of the wood.

While the Grandfather Tree undoubtedly produced thousands of walnuts every year, most were eaten by squirrels, and the ones that did sprout often failed to grow. They could be eaten by deer, or a single dry season could cause them to fail. They also had to compete with all of the other types of grasses, shrubs, and trees around them. It seems that the walnut saplings need at a minimum 7 years of the correct amount of moisture (not too much, not too little) in order to reach the stage where they can sustain themselves to maturity.

The grove where my walnut trees grow shows testament to this story. Surrounding The Grandfather Tree are a ring of trees about 200 years old. Only 7 or 8 are still living, and the wood I use comes from those that have died from natural causes.

Surrounding those are another ring of trees about 100 years old. Lastly, there are saplings about 40 years old. I remember wandering among these tiny trees when I was a teenager in the 1970s. There were hundreds of saplings 6 to 10 feet tall and 1 inch in diameter. On my last visit in the fall of 2020, there were only 10 or so left standing, about 30 feet tall and 3 inches in diameter. These will be the trees for future generations to enjoy.

Which Trees Do I Harvest?

I only harvest trees that are either already dead or their death is inevitable.

Walnut trees cannot live forever. My father once said, “They like their feet in the water and their heads in the sunshine”.

They sprout and grow in valleys where there is a stream to supply constant water, and yet they can become tall enough to have their tops in the open air and sunshine.

Over hundreds of years, streams meander and change their course. Sometimes a walnut tree is undercut by the changing course of the stream, and with half of its roots exposed they inexorably begin to fall towards the stream. This process can take 20 to 30 years, however, once started it cannot be reversed.

Without reclamation, the outcome is for the tree to die, fall into the stream bed, and eventually rot away.

I “harvest” only trees that are in the process of falling and cannot be recovered. The alternative is to let the wood rot, which seems to me to be such a waste of a beautiful natural resource.