English Walnuts

Christian and Susan have a small back yard with a very large walnut tree.

                        The walnut tree

This year it is producing a bumper crop of walnuts. They look like this: 

                                                      Walnuts

Squirrels are understandably attracted to this tree. At any given moment, there are quite a few of them up on the tree eating walnuts. Look carefully and you'll see one here:

                           Squirrel eating a walnut

The result is that the ground under the tree - which is most of the yard - is completely littered with walnuts and pieces of walnuts. When you sit outside it sounds like it's raining. That's how steady is the stream of falling walnut fragments. This is what it look like: 

                            Walnut litter in the yard

This is not just unsightly and slightly dangerous - you could turn an ankle stepping on a walnut - an enzyme in the walnuts is killing the grass. Ellen and I decided that one way we could express thanks for S&C's hospitality was by picking up walnuts. We picked and raked and bagged probably a half-dozen or so bags of walnut litter. 

                        Bagging walnut litter

We ate supper outside on the patio tonight and it looked nice. Unfortunately, it won't stay that way. The squirrels will see to that!