This beautiful, glorious tree species gets its name from having a large fruit with a thick husk, but a relatively small nut inside. The nut is sweet, but hard to extract. This husk-nut is about 2 inches in diameter. borne in late summer into early Autumn. It is found mostly in much of the South USA or just above the South in drier soils. Native from southern New England to central Florida to east Texas up to southeast Iowa and central Illinois. Its compound leaves get to 12 inches long and have 7 to 9 leaflets that are soft hairy beneath. It bears a strong deep taproot, so is difficult to transplant, but it can be done in early spring as a small tree. It is slow growing of about 6 to 8 inches/year and lives about 200 to 250 years. Some native plant and specialty nurseries offer it.

Reply to this comment

At this time of year leaves of this hickory are brilliant in shades of golden yellow. Although not suitable for landscape trees they are gorgeous in natural wooded settings among mature species of other trees. My only tree was damaged by age and storms and had to be removed a few years back. I decided against replacing it because of the massive volume of hickory nuts produced in autumn. In natural wooded areas they are great for encouraging wildlife.

Reply to this comment