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From: ndmead%gr.cs.utah.edu@cs.utah.edu (Nathan Mead)
Subject: Re: Hazelnut Farm - Am I nuts?
Date: 6 Aug 93 18:50:38 MDT
Message-ID: <1993Aug6.185039.6631@hellgate.utah.edu>
Organization: University of Utah
References: <ward9-270793072040@macward.s1.gov>
Lines: 51

In article <ward9-270793072040@macward.s1.gov>, ward9@llnl.gov (Rich Ward) writes:
|> I've been looking into acquiring a hazelnut farm.  

< deleted >

|> I would appreciate any pointers from those of you
|> that have experience in this area.  

As I have farmed hazelnuts for the last 20 years I'll toss in my 0.02$ worth. 
A filbert farm is a good hobby but a hard way to make a living.  The trees require a reasonable amount of care year round, from pruning in the winter, suckering, spraying and mowing in the spring and summer to harveting in the 
fall.  With the exception of harvesting and spraying nothing is real time critical and can wait a while if desired.  And farming in the shade is the 
only way to go.

|> Particularly what are the potential
|> pitfalls? Are there any diseases or nematodes that wipe out whole orchards?

Yes.  Eastern filbert blight kills the trees and there is no known cure.  
At my last understanding it was primarly found in southern Washington and 
the tri-counties area around Portland, although infected trees have been 
found in most of the Willamette vally.  It spreads slowly but is very nasty.
To the best of my knowledge none of the commerical varities are resistance although the common polinizer Daviana is one of the most susceptible.

|> Why have hazelnut prices gone from 40+ to 28 cents over the past three
|> years; is this just cyclic farm prices or is there something going on at
|> the nut houses?

There are as many theories about this as there are filbert farmers.  The 
big three are.  

1) Large overseas crops.  The U.S. grows a tiny fraction of all the 
filberts grown in the world.  Turkey is the biggie with around 50%-70% 
of the world production.  They have a good crop the price goes in the 
dumper.  

2)  Increased domestic production.  Despite the loss of many acres of 
orchard around Portland the total producing acerage keeps going up.  
A lot of trees were planted back in the early 80's when prices were 
high and now those trees are reaching full production.  Generally these 
orchards are high density plantings ( 200+ trees/acre ) and have higher 
yeilds than the older orchards.  

3)  The recession.  For years much of the domestic crop was exported, most
to Europe.  With the Europian economy in worse shape than ours they are 
buying fewer of our nuts.

Hope this helps.

Nathan Mead
Center for Engineering Design
University of Utah
  


