Blueprint planning for our farm, What can we grow near black walnut tree?, February 13, 2022

We created a high-level descriptive blueprint of where we see our property in five years. Now with the verbal description we need to go into the diagrams and detailed descriptions so we can plan and look for materials. It is a vision board for the farm. First and foremost, comes the pasture, pasture fence and compost for the gardens. But this week we must get the elderberries into larger pots and we found very inexpensive potting bags to transplant them into. We will show the bags in a video this week. They are not cloth, just temporary transplant bags.

We spend some time on Sunday’s counseling together to decide what the week looks like. What projects must move to the top and what projects do we finally get to start and what do we finally get to complete. It helps us feel organized and not so overwhelmed by long lists. The lists are still there but our breakoff list for the week is much smaller.

Nutritional Information

We live in Black Walnut country. We have at least 4 of these on our property. Why does it matter? Because they give off a toxin called juglone and is deadly to many plants. One of these trees on our property stand at the end of the garden where we just put the fence posts in to protect the garden from the cows. We were planning on putting corn at the far end near the tree. You will see that that is okay. But putting tomatoes near the tree are not. More planning ahead. Here is the research we have unveiled.

Garden plot with walnut tree
The tree at the end of the garden plot is Black Walnut.

I will give a list of plants that do not do well near them and then a list of plants that do just fine around them. The plants or trees that don’t do well should be 50 to 80 feet away from them. We are having to look carefully at placement of certain plants we want and decide on proper location.

Keep away from black walnut trees

Tomatoes, peppers, asparagus, cabbage, peas, potatoes, rhubarb and most nightshades. Apple trees, blueberries, blackberries,

Plants that do well near black walnut trees

Beans, beets, carrots, cauliflower, cherries, plum, peaches, nectarines, corn, garlic, leeks, onions, melons, squash