Bitternut Hickory

Size, growth and what to expect

Bitternut is the fastest-growing hickory, and our growth estimator models it at a foot and a half a year. Second-growth trees on a good Ohio Valley site stood 24 feet at 20 years and 52 feet at 40. Expect 50 to 80 feet in a yard, with a crown 30 to 50 feet wide, and about 100 feet in the forest.

It flowers in April and May, and the nuts ripen in September and October. Each fruit is about an inch long, in a thin husk with four wings above the middle, around a thin-shelled nut. It is the shortest-lived hickory, living to about 200 years. Its leaves feed luna and regal moth caterpillars.

It grows wild from southwestern New Hampshire and southern Quebec west to Minnesota, and south to eastern Texas and northwestern Florida. Its home is river floodplains, stream banks and moist valleys, and it also grows on dry uplands and limestone glades.

How to grow Bitternut Hickory

Bitternut hickory grows best in full sun or light shade on a deep, rich, moist soil that drains. It also takes wet bottomland that floods now and then, drier upland soil and limestone. It suffers in compacted soil, so keep traffic off its roots. Set trees 40 feet apart, and keep each one 30 feet from a wall and more than 50 feet from overhead wires.

Saplings ship bare-root or potted. Plant a dormant sapling in early spring, before the buds swell. Dig the hole deep enough for the taproot to hang straight. Set the root flare at the soil line, put the native soil back in, and keep the mulch clear of the trunk. Sow nuts in fall an inch deep under hardware cloth, or squirrels dig them up. For spring, soak them two to four days, then chill them damp in the refrigerator for 90 to 120 days.

Water weekly through the first summer when rain is short, since it likes a moist soil. Rabbits gnaw young hickory bark and deer browse the tips, so guard the tree with a tube or cage for three years. Prune in the dormant season to keep a single leader, since its branching can weaken a tree.

Male and female flowers grow on the same tree, and the male catkins usually open before the female flowers, so a second bitternut nearby improves the set. Seedling trees bear in quantity at about 30 years, with good crops every three to five years. The hickory bark beetle strikes in drought years, twig girdlers clip branches and seedlings, and nut weevils take much of the crop. No severe disease troubles it, though white heart rot can enter through wounds.