Buccaneer Walnut Trees

Buccaneer Walnut trees - Cooking and pickling walnuts

Buccaneer is the best choice of walnut to grow in UK gardens if you are looking for walnuts to use in cooking or to pickle. For eaters, look at our nut tree list

It is a medium-sized deciduous tree and with regular pruning, it can be kept to a manageable size of around 15-17ft (5 metres) making it a good choice of walnut tree for the smaller garden. It can be pruned heavily to restrict its size and this will promote heavy cropping. Looked after well, your Buccaneer Walnut tree should start to carry nuts 3-4 years after planting instead of the more typical 10-15 years with Juglans regia.

Being self-fertile Buccaneer Walnuts do not need a pollinator. If you want pickled walnuts, the fruit should be harvested green before the shell has hardened. For cooking, leave them on the tree until autumn to ripen when they are dried and can then be stored.

Browse our full range of nut trees for sale or see the full variety of fruit trees online.

'Buccaneer' Walnut Tree facts

Buccaneer copes much better with the British climate than the larger native varieties. This is mainly because its foliage shows late in the season making it less likely to suffer from frost.

How to plant walnut trees

Walnuts grow in most areas, but like a rich free draining soil where there is plenty of sun. Container grown, they can be planted at any time of year; they establish faster if planted into warm soil in late spring or early summer. Space walnuts at least 7-8 metres apart. Dig a spacious planting hole and incorporate plenty of well-rotted compost. Adding some Rootgrow speeds establishment. Return the soil and firm (no stamping though). Water really well and keep well watered until fully established. Mulch in March or April each year.

Pruning should be undertaken between mid-summer and early autumn to avoid excessive bleeding. All they need is a regular pinching out of growth at the fifth or sixth leaves to encourage bushy new growth.

Walnut wood is the best wood for making gunstocks and works well on a lathe and as a veneer. It is also probably the most valuable timber that grows in the UK. A full-grown walnut tree that has been grown straight and without large branches is worth several thousand pounds as it stands.