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Shagbark Hickory
A stately, long-lived native hardwood with unmistakable shaggy, peeling bark - and the sweetest, best-flavored nuts of any wild hickory - grown as much for its grandeur and wildlife value as for its delicious (if hard-to-crack) nut crop.
Safety notes Shagbark hickory nuts are delicious and safe - among the sweetest and best-flavored of all native nuts - and are a common tree-nut allergen. The nuts are simply gathered and cracked; there's no toxicity concern. The main practical considerations are the tree's slow growth and long wait for nuts, its deep taproot (which makes it hard to transplant), and hard-shelled nuts that take some effort to crack. Its bark is used to flavor a homemade 'hickory syrup,' but the nut is the main food.
Overview
Shagbark hickory (Carya ovata) is one of the most distinctive and beloved native trees of the eastern forest - a tall (60-90 foot), long-lived hardwood instantly recognized by its shaggy, peeling bark, which breaks into long gray plates that curl away from the trunk at both ends like an unkempt coat. Its golden fall color, strong open form, and that shaggy bark make it a magnificent tree in every season.
Quick facts
- Sprouts in
- 60 daysRange: 30–120 days
- Soil temperature
- 65 °FRange: 55–75 °F
- Height
- 75 ftRange: 60–90 ft
- Spread
- 35 ftRange: 25–45 ft
- Cold
- Takes hard frostdamaged below -35°F
- Heat
- Struggles above 100°F
- Life cycle
- Perennial, lives about 250 years
- Save seeds
- About 180 days after plantingRange: 150–210 days
- Self-sows
- Yes, expect volunteers
- Soil
- Well-drained
- Water
- Medium
- Plant spacing
- 40 ftRange: 30–60 ft
When to plant
Fall sowing is open for 20 more days. Next: spring, Mar 27 to May 22.
- Direct sow Sep 27 – Nov 8 Open now · 20 days leftAbout 4 weeks before to 2 weeks after your first frost (Oct 25 here)Plant whole nuts in fall right where the tree will grow; they need winter stratification and germinate in spring, immediately forming a deep taproot that makes transplanting hard. Direct-sowing gives the strongest tree. Protect nuts from squirrels with a screen.
- Transplant Mar 27 – May 22 Opens in 159 daysAbout 2 weeks before to 6 weeks after your last frost (Apr 10 here)Plant a young container hickory in spring, choosing the smallest tree available, since the deep taproot resents disturbance and larger transplants establish poorly. Full sun and deep, well-drained soil.
Frost here: last around Apr 10 (Mar 27 to Apr 24 most years), first around Oct 25. Zone averages, your own yard may run a week or two either way.
Life stages
Establish, grow, repeat
Getting established and returning each season are different parts of the story.
Stage 1 of 5 · Getting established
Years 1-4 - slow young tree
About the first 4 years after planting
Care at this stage
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Water while establishing, and be patient
Water a young shagbark hickory deeply and regularly through its first few years. It grows slowly on top while building a deep taproot below, so slow early top growth is normal - it's investing underground. Plant it small (or from a nut in place), since the taproot makes transplanting hard.
-
Mulch the root zone
A wide mulch ring conserves moisture and keeps mowers away; keep it back from the trunk. Hickory likes deep, well-drained upland soil and roots in slowly but permanently.
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Site it with room for a big, long-lived tree
Shagbark hickory becomes a large (60-90 foot), very long-lived tree with a deep taproot. Give it full sun and generous room away from buildings, and plan for a tree - and eventually nuts and shaggy bark - that will outlast you. This is a plant-for-the-future tree.
Months are typical seasonal windows; climate, variety, and plant age can shift them.
Harvest
- Thick green husks dried and split open along four seams in fall, dropping the nuts
- Nuts fully tan/brown inside the husk, dropping freely or shaking down
- Kernel inside a test nut is plump, sweet, and fully filled (not shriveled)
- Empty or weevil-damaged nuts float in a water test and are discarded
- Gather nuts as the husks split and drop · every 3 days
- Race the squirrels for the crop
Per plant 200 to 5000 nuts, 5 to 100 lbPicking pick as they ripen
Cook with Shagbark Hickory
Watch out for
3 to know. None are high-risk for Shagbark Hickory. 2 are active in October.
Squirrels & RodentsSeverity Medium WildlifenowSeason: Sep–DecChewed husks, shells or hulls scattered under the plant, fruit and nuts vanishing as they ripen, and gnawed or half-eaten windfalls.
Squirrels and chipmunks will take a hickory's whole crop, and there is no practical way to exclude a climber from a big tree. Worth remembering that hickory nuts are a keystone wild food and that the squirrels plant most of the next generation of trees.
Chewed husks, shells or hulls scattered under the plant, fruit and nuts vanishing as they ripen, and gnawed or half-eaten windfalls. On new plantings: freshly dug holes and scattered soil, bulbs missing or gnawed, dug-up seed rows, vole runways under the mulch, and gaps in spring where you know you planted.
There is no rescue for what has already been eaten, so this is a prevention problem. Re-cover disturbed plantings with mesh promptly, replant losses inside cages, and trap or exclude persistent diggers where that is legal locally. On a large tree, accept that you will share the crop and concentrate on gathering promptly.
For a crop on the plant, timely and frequent harvest is the real defense - gather daily through the ripening window rather than leaving anything to hang, and pick slightly early to finish indoors where the crop allows it. Net or bag what you can reach. For bulbs and sown seed, lay wire mesh or hardware cloth over the planting, plant deeper, use buried wire baskets, and clear away the papery tunics and debris that advertise a fresh planting. Trunk baffles slow climbers on isolated trees, clearing jumping routes from nearby trees and roofs helps, and removing brush cover reduces the rodents sheltering nearby.
Squirrels, chipmunks, voles and mice are the wildlife that competes with you most directly for a crop. They take ripening nuts, seed and fruit off the plant, usually before you judge it ready, and cache what they do not eat. They also dig up freshly planted bulbs and sown seed, and voles tunnel in to gnaw bulbs and roots underground through winter. They climb anything, they know exactly when a crop is ripe, and a determined pair can clear a small tree or a new planting in a few days.
Hickory Nut WeevilSeverity Low PestnowSeason: Aug–OctSmall round exit holes in nut shells, grubs inside otherwise sound-looking nuts, and light nuts that float during a water test.
Small round exit holes in nut shells, grubs inside otherwise sound-looking nuts, and light nuts that float during a water test.
Discard infested and floating nuts; no treatment is needed for the tree. Prompt sanitation (removing fallen infested nuts) reduces weevil numbers over time.
Gather nuts promptly after they drop (before larvae mature and exit), rake up and destroy dropped infested nuts to break the cycle, and do a float test to cull damaged nuts before storing.
Long-snouted weevils whose larvae develop inside developing hickory nuts, hollowing out the kernel - a factor if you're gathering nuts to eat, though harmless to the tree itself. Infested nuts are often light and float in a water test.
Hickory Bark BeetleSeverity Low PestSeason: May–AugSmall round beetle entry/exit holes and boring dust on the trunk and branches, yellowing or dying upper branches, and decline in drought-stressed or injured trees.
Small round beetle entry/exit holes and boring dust on the trunk and branches, yellowing or dying upper branches, and decline in drought-stressed or injured trees.
There's no simple home cure - the best defense is tree vigor; promptly remove dead or dying infested limbs and wood to reduce beetle breeding sites, and consult a forester if a stand is affected.
Keep trees vigorous and unstressed - water in drought, avoid trunk wounds and soil compaction; healthy hickories resist the beetle well. Remove and dispose of dead or heavily infested wood.
A bark beetle that bores into the inner bark of stressed, weakened, or drought-hit hickories, constructing galleries that can girdle branches and, in outbreaks on already-stressed trees, contribute to dieback and death; healthy vigorous trees are rarely seriously affected.
Good & bad neighbors
Plant nearby
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A native understory tree that blooms beneath the high hickory canopy, mirroring the natural composition of an eastern oak-hickory forest.
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A native understory small tree that flowers and fruits in the light shade at a hickory's edge - a natural layered woodland structure with extra wildlife value.
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The classic oak-hickory forest pairing - two keystone, long-lived, nut-bearing native canopy trees that together define the eastern hardwood forest and feed immense wildlife; give each ample room.
- Traditional pairings, thin evidence
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Two native fruit/nut trees of the eastern woods that share tough upland conditions and feed wildlife in fall - a natural native-food pairing for a backyard forest garden.
Varieties · 4
You pick one when you add Shagbark Hickory to your garden. Its days to maturity set your harvest window.
Shagbark Hickory (Carya ovata) - wild seedling
The wild native: a tall (60-90 foot), long-lived tree with unmistakable shaggy peeling bark and the sweetest, best-flavored nuts of any wild hickory.
Variety details for Shagbark Hickory (Carya ovata) - wild seedling
Tall tree with long, gray, shaggy peeling bark plates, golden fall color, and hard-shelled sweet nuts.
speciesnativesweet-nutshaggy-barkSlow-growing and slow to bear (10-25 years), with hard-to-crack nuts, but a magnificent, tough, keystone wildlife tree.
Grainger
A named shagbark selection valued for larger nuts, good kernel quality, easier cracking, and reliable production - one of the better grafted cultivars for a home grower willing to seek out a hard-to-find grafted hickory.
Variety details for Grainger
Productive shagbark with larger, better-filled, more easily cracked nuts.
cultivarlarge-nutproductivebetter-crackingShellbark Hickory (Carya laciniosa)
A separate species (also called kingnut), not a form of shagbark: a tree of moist bottomlands with even larger nuts and similar shaggy bark - the biggest of the native hickory nuts.
Variety details for Shellbark Hickory (Carya laciniosa)
Large tree with shaggy bark and very large, thick-shelled sweet nuts.
speciesnativelargest-nutbottomlandBecause it tolerates wetter, richer soils than upland shagbark, take the siting advice on this page as shagbark's; a shellbark wants the low, damp ground shagbark would sulk in.
Pecan (Carya illinoinensis)
The Southern hickory relative grown commercially for its thin-shelled, easy-cracking, buttery nuts - faster to bear and far easier to shell than shagbark, but needing a long hot summer and two pollination types.
Variety details for Pecan (Carya illinoinensis)
Large Southern tree with long compound leaves and thin-shelled, easy-cracking nuts.
speciesnativethin-shellcommercial-nutThe choice where easy nuts and the South's climate favor it. See the separate 'pecan' catalog entry.
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