So, obviously, don't keep green acorns in a sealed plastic bag. If this moisture is allowed to build up, and the temperature is above roughly 38 degrees F, your sealed plastic bag of acorns will shortly turn into a sealed plastic bag of mold. Once sealed, you will soon see moisture collecting on the inside of the plastic bag. Next, let's consider what happens if you collect green acorns into a clear plastic bag, and seal the bag. From this experience I learned to only allow drying acorns to be one or two layers deep. So the air at the bottom became overly humid, and the lower levels of acorns rotted. In the past, I have tried ripening green acorns in a bowl, but the acorns were 5 or more layers deep within the bowl, and the acorns at the bottom didn't have good air flow. Something like a baking tray has proven ideal. With green acorns, I have found that simply letting picked the green acorns air dry in the house works fine, so long as there is good air movement over all the acorns. Too much humidity kills, and so does too little. Like any living organism, an acorn must maintain homeostasis, which includes maintaining a livable range of humidities. Please always keep in mind that an acorn is a living organism - or at least the embryo at the tip of the acorn is. The only way to know the condition of the acorn meat inside a tan colored acorn is to look. Healthy acorn meat should be on the whitish or yellowish side. With dead and desiccated acorns, either the embryo dies and turns dark, or the stored carbohydrate in the acorn pericarp turns dark, or both. Tan colored acorns must be opened to check for viability - cutting a sample of tan acorns open allows checking the health of the acorn meat. Green acorns are full of moisture which must be gradually released, and the acorns gradually turn brown.ĭry the acorns too much, and the acorn shell turns tan on the outside. So how do you get those sufficiently-ripened green acorns to fully ripen to brown? You have to dry them, slowly and carefully. Fully ripened acorns are brownish in color. But if the acorn releases cleanly, and the hilum stays intact on the acorn as intended, that acorn is sufficiently ripe to pick, though it is not yet fully ripened. If the hilum stays with the cup, ripping the hilum from the acorn top, the acorn is destroyed, and will rot. Grasp an accessible green acorn on a desired oak, holding the green acorn in the fingertips of one hand, while holding the acorn cup in the fingertips of the other hand. The way to know if a green acorn is sufficiently ripe to pick is simple. This is the circle of light colored material at the "top" of a ripe acorn. The hilum is the connection between the acorn and its cup, or cap. The key to early picking is a part of the acorn called the hilum. If you can easily return in a week or two, then that's probably a good solution.īut what if you can't easily return? Or what if you are concerned that acorn predators may get to the ripening acorns before you are able to return? If the green acorns are accessible to picking, you may be able to collect nearly-ripe green acorns, if you are observant and careful. The timing of acorns ripening is never exact from year to year, so it is very possible to arrive at a producing, desirable oak, only to find the acorns are still green. Often, collecting desirable acorns requires travel for hours. Read on for an opportunity to learn from my successes and mistakes. I've killed tens of thousands of acorns, either by letting them be too wet, or too dry. Seems it is often easier to collect acorns than it is to handle and store them properly. While tens of thousands of cool and unusual oaks have been grown from acorns I've collected, there have been massive acorn losses along the way. I've earned this knowledge honestly, and painfully. After more than 30 years of acorn collecting, I've learned things about acorn handling and storage that are neither obvious, nor commonly known, even among oak-cognoscenti.
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