milbo said:Doduse, you're going to have to clean up a massive amount of debris just to net a single pound of walnuts, and even then, that's $13 max.
Yeah, an astronomical amount of work; you won't get more than a minute's worth out of even the cheapest machine...
Walnut trees usually start producing about two years after planting, regardless of how old the sapling was, though they go through a bit of a growing phase first. Grafted walnut trees typically reach full production 7 to 10 years after being planted, and honestly, most of them start giving out after about 40 years because once they hit a certain size, the yields just start dropping off...
Since people often plant walnuts and just wait for them to grow, it’s pretty common for a sudden frost to kill them off during those early years while the trees are still too low to the ground. Once they mature, though, the risk from frost drops significantly since the blossoms end up sitting three or four feet higher...
If you actually have a choice in the matter, try to find a Black Walnut rootstock, as that's really what's best suited for this climate. Go pick a few different varieties of walnuts in the area—maybe ask neighbors for a few nuts, some big ones and some small—plant them, and you'll get your "seedlings." You've probably heard of that method before. Once you have those, graft them onto that Black Walnut rootstock.
Forget about those prices of $13 per pound for the kernel; you're better off calculating based on $8.25 if you want any kind of realistic expectation...