MidWest Tour Day 5

Crop Tour Day 5 - The Collaboration of Community and Agriculture

By Ele Engin, Simon Enns, Jillian Hamm, & Laureen Hoonard

So far on our tour we have seen the importance of the relationships between farms and communities such as the customer relationship at The Farm Connection and the YouTube community outreach at Griggs farms (visited on Day 2). Farmers have noted the disconnect between agricultural operations and their surrounding communities. Both stops today highlighted the importance of how communities and agriculture need to support one another. 

A close up of a Black Walnut treeToday our tour started at Hammons Black Walnuts processing facility in Stockton, Missouri. Hammons Black Walnuts have been in operation since 1946, when Ralph Hammons began buying black walnuts from local Ozarks people. Ralph saw a niche to be filled, so he purchased a cracking machine and began processing black walnuts. Hammons has a very unique business model. Black walnut trees grow naturally all over the United States, with around 65 million trees in Missouri alone, the largest number of trees in a single state. The black walnut trees grow on hillsides, in rocky land, in pastures, and more. People from 13 states harvest black walnuts from their trees and sell them to Hammons. In an average year, Hammons processes 15-20 million pounds of black walnuts, but the total quantity is very dependent on how many people harvest and sell their walnuts to Hammons. Currently, Hammons is the only black walnut processing facility in the world. Their unique business model and niche product have kept Hammons in business for over 75 years.  

Black walnuts have many purposes, some of the most common being used in baking, black walnut ice cream, black walnut oil, chocolate covered black walnuts, and more. 

Black walnuts trees forms fruits in a shell that is surrounded by a green husk. The first step after the black walnuts are harvested is taking them to the husking facility to husk the green husk off the nut. There are around 200 husking facilities across America. Once husked, the black walnuts are bagged and shipped to Hammons in Stockton, Missouri. The walnuts are required to be dried down to 4.5% moisture before they proceed with the cracking of the nuts. Hammons has multiple drying sheds, which are a covered roof with open sides. The walnuts are dried naturally by the wind right in the mesh bags they arrive in. Once dry, the nuts go through the cracking machine, which cracks the shells. All of the pieces are run down sorting conveyers which use lasers to sort out nut pieces from shell pieces. Â