Tall Butternut (Black Diamond) Traditional Cache

This Butternut is so tall it's hard to make out the leaves. Even the sprouts on the trunk are hard to distinguish. My guess is that the tall old trees along the RR were kept trimmed because of steam engines and fire hazard. As always, BYOP.

From: Gardening Know How:

What are butternuts? No, don’t think squash, think trees. Butternut (Juglans cinerea) is a species of walnut tree that is native to the eastern United States and Canada. And the nuts that grow on these wild trees are easy to process and delicious to eat.

Butternut trees are also called white walnut trees because they have pale gray bark and are related to the black walnut tree (Juglans nigra) and other members of the walnut family. White walnut trees grow to 60 feet tall in the wild, with dark green leaves arranged in leaflets up to 20 inches long.

When you are learning butternut tree information, the nuts themselves are of top interest. The fruit of the butternut tree is a nut. It is not round like the nut of the black walnut tree, but elongated, longer than it is wide. The nut is deeply ridged and grows inside a green, hairy husk until they mature in mid-autumn.

Squirrels and other wildlife love butternuts. Are butternuts edible by humans? They most certainly are, and have been eaten by Native Americans for centuries. Butternut trees, or white walnut trees, produce rich and delicious nuts. The butternut is an oily nut that can be eaten as is when mature or prepared in a variety of ways. The Iroquis crushed and boiled butternuts and served the mixture as baby food or drinks, or processed it into breads, puddings, and sauces.

Growing Butternuts

It is entirely possible to start growing butternuts in your backyard, if you have a site with rich, loamy soil. The trees are vigorous and live for some 75 years. However, the butternut tree is now a threatened species due to its susceptibility to a fungal canker disease, Sirococcus clavigignenti-jug-landacearum, also called “butter-nut canker.” Its populations in the wild have diminished and in many places it is rare. Hybrids, where white walnut trees are crossed with Japanese walnut, are more resistant to the canker.

This from: How to Identify Butternut Canker and Manage Butternut Trees

by the U.S. Forest Service

Butternut Canker

Butternut is being killed throughout its range by Sirococcus clavigignenti-juglandacearum, a fungus most likely introduced from outside of North America (fig. 2). The fungus initially infects trees through buds, leaf scars, and possibly insect wounds and other openings in the bark, rapidly killing small branches. Spores produced on branches are carried down the stem by rain, resulting in multiple, perennial stem cankers that eventually girdle and kill infected trees.

Butternut canker was first reported from southwestern Wisconsin in 1967; however, it has probably been present much longer than that based on detailed examinations of killed trees in North and South Carolina. The disease has contributed to as much as an 80 percent decrease in living butternut in some States.

Typical cankers with bark removed, revealing the elliptical areas of killed cambium

Disease Description

Young, annual cankers are elongated, sunken areas commonly originating at leaf scars and buds , often with an inky black center and whitish margin . Under the bark, the fungus forms pegs that break through the outer bark surface, exposing the spores . Peeling the bark away reveals the brown to black elliptical areas of killed cambium . Older, perennial branch and stem cankers are often found in bark fissures , or covered by bark and bordered by successive callus layers . Cankers develop throughout a tree, but commonly occur on the main stem, at the base of trees and on exposed roots. Butternut is the only natural host known to be killed by the fungus. The fungus can survive on dead trees for at least 2 years. It is spread by rainsplashed spores, possibly by insects and birds, and perhaps by seeds.

Read more at Gardening Know How: Is Growing Butternuts Possible: Information About White Walnut Trees https://www.gardeningknowhow.com/edible/nut-trees/walnut/growing-butternut-trees.htm

You can find more info on my other Butternut cache page;

<https://www.geocaching.com/geocache/GC6WGRW_big-butternut>

That one is by the city golf club.

The cache is a tied in, camoed, “micro” pill bottle that you have to push hard both to open and close. Please BYOP and keep track of the rubber band and seal the little bag snuggly, and racamo, please.