Black walnut harvest has people going nuts in Ozarks community

STOCKTON, Mo. -- Brian Hammons firmly believes that there are a lot of nuts all over the country, but the best ones come from Missouri.

Hammons is referring to eastern black walnuts, of course.

He's president and chief executive of Hammons Products Company. The 55-year-old company nestled in the southwest Missouri town of Stockton is the country's only commercial processor of the black walnuts. And this is their busy season.

Between Oct. 1 and Nov. 5, thousands of people in Missouri and 12 east-central states gather the nuts that grow wild on trees in lawns, pastures and fields. They'll then head to one of the approximately 250 buying stations, where they'll earn $10 per 100 pounds of hulled nuts.

Hammons sees no trouble reaching his quota of 30 million pounds of black walnuts.

"It looks like we've been blessed with a great crop here in the Ozarks and the other states," he says. "If the weather holds, we expect to buy all the nuts that we need to service our customers."

Eastern black walnuts have a rich, pungent flavor and typically are not a favorite among hand-to-mouth eaters, Hammons says. The nuts are sold under the Hammons Products Company label at supermarkets across the country for use in cookies, cakes, pies and other dishes.

Leading supplier of grit

The second largest use of black walnuts is ice cream. Hammons Products sells nuts to a variety of companies, such as Baskin-Robbins, Hiland Dairy Foods and Prairie Farms.

Hammons Products, which averages about $11 million in annual sales, is also the world's leading supplier of black walnut soft grit abrasives. The ground shell is sold for a variety of industrial uses, such as cleaning abrasives, soaps, cosmetics and oil-well drilling.

Hammons Products relies on people like 82-year-old Rudy Hibsch of Springfield to scrounge for nuts and then hustle them to market. Hibsch estimates there are 35 black walnut trees on the 46 acres he owns in Springfield.

"Picking up walnuts is hard work," says Hibsch as he looks over the numerous buckets and bags of nuts stuffed into the bed of his Chevy pickup. "I'm not a guy who can sit around, though, so it gives me something to do."

Hibsch was making his fifth trip of the season to the hulling station at Ozarks Empire Fairgrounds in Springfield. He expected to collect about 1,500 pounds before the harvest cutoff. Hibsch, who is retired, says the extra money comes in handy.

Cledith Green and neighbor Keri Tuten say they stumbled on nature's money makers by accident.

Green wanted a few black walnuts for fudge and brownies, so she asked a friend if she could pick up the nuts in her yard.

"While I was there, a man came up and asked me if I'd like to have the ones in his yard, too," Green says. "It's just sort of grown from there."

She enlisted the help of Tuten, and the two are spending their autumn days on their hands and knees, stuffing black walnuts into their T-shirt tails.

Those gathering said this year's harvest was good -- but it's nowhere near the bumper crop of nearly 49 million pounds that the company purchased in 1999.

Some 10 million pounds of hulled black walnuts were delivered by Oct. 15 to Hammons Products plant to be cleaned, dried and cracked. Black walnuts are extremely hard, so the nuts are run between large steel wheels that crack the shells. They then pass through another series of rollers with saw-like teeth that pluck the nutmeat from the shell.

The nutmeat then passes through an electronic sorting machine that removes shell pieces and discolored nutmeat. Finally, trained inspectors give the nuts the once-over to ensure quality before they are packaged and sold.

"By the end of the night, I'm tired of looking at nuts," says inspector Alice Pohl, one of 100 full-time workers at the plant.