Harvesting Hazelnuts

I’ve always been interested in harvesting hazelnuts, and this summer I finally had a chance. There are lots of hazelnut bushes in the oak barrens in my area, and one afternoon my daughter and I were out wandering about looking for wildflowers and I decided to check out some bushes I knew of on Fish Lake Wildlife Area that I thought may be ripe. They were, and we took home a 5 gallon bucket full of them.img_1740

Hazelnuts are ripe and ready to pick when the husk is still green but starting to yellow a bit.
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These are likely over-ripe and there’s a good chance there are bugs in them. We picked them anyway, because there was also a chance they were fine.
The nuts inside look good!
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My daughter Adeline enjoyed spending time with me, I mean, who wouln’t?
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A few of the nuts had bug holes in them, discard these ones.
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This one looks good! Once home, I spent some time removing the nuts from their husks.
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I finished the project with a 1/2 gallon jar full of hazelnuts ready to be cracked and eaten. Not bad for a couple hours work.