Right now blooming hazel bushes in full swing here in Dalarna and have actually done it for a while. Many probably know the male flowers, but how does the female flowers out really?
Honblomman looks much like a conventional knob, the difference is that there is a very small flower on the tip of the knob. It can be anywhere from dark red to purple and are different in different cultivars. Hazel bushes are wind pollinated, and it needed a different kind (or wild hazel) whose male flowers bloom at the same time for pollination to occur.
Unfortunately, many female flowers no guarantee that it will be harvest this year, although there are currently many fruitful pollen catkins nearby, because we have both wild hazel and many different cultivars in the forest garden. The reason it is still uncertain whether there will be any fruit has to do with how the fertilization of the female flowers occur. The pollen is spread in spring, but then turns into a kind of rest period in anticipation of fertilization to take place in early June. If it gets too cold (colder than about. -7 grader) before conception dies pollen in honblomman and there will be no nuts. Last year it was precisely what happened in Putt Myra forest garden, and only one of prydnadshasslarna bore fruit, probably because it was little more protected than the other bushes. But there will be no more severe frost during the next five weeks, it may well be a few kilos of nuts this year!
Hazel pollination seems to be quite rare considering waiting time, etc.
Most things in nature usually supposed to happen for a reason, what it may be in this case?
Do you use hazelnuts, fresh? And if so, how does the taste turned toward the saving and cracks, for example at Christmas?
The hazelnuts you want to save should be dried guess, do it on the stretched mesh or how do you resolve the issue?
Interesting with nötodling, hope to eventually be able to plant some hazelnuts and a heart walnut in future forest garden.
Thanks for all the exciting and useful reading !
Inger
It was a good question that I do not have answers…but as you say there are usually good reasons why it happens in nature. Maybe someone else knows?
We often eat hazelnuts, fresh also, they are a little crispier and very good, I think. In Denmark, I think it is common to be able to buy fresh hazelnuts in store. It is important to dry the nuts properly if you want them to last long. If you want to be on the safe side, you can dry them in 50 degrees in the oven (with the door ajar to get rid of the moisture) over night. We usually just put them on the network we span the ceiling. It is mussäkert and warm enough to dry the nuts (for a few weeks) so they are a year or so.
Thanks for the info! (:D