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Butternut, Uses and How to Know if it is a Hybrid ©

 

Author’s note -- I hope that you enjoy learning from this resource!  To help me to continue to provide valuable free content, please consider showing your appreciation by leaving a donation HERE.  Thank you and Happy Trails!

 

The Butternut, juglans cinerea, is a fascinating species of tree, historically it’s nuts were used as food by Native Americans and early settlers, since the kernel of the nut is sweet, oily, and edible; it was also a source medium brown wood, herbal medicines and sugar-sap. 

  

But today, the Butternut tree is a tree under pressure, both from hybridization with the Japanese walnut, juglans ailantifolia, and from a fungus called sirococcus clavigignenti-juglandacearum, which is the cause of Butternut canker, which is a lethal stem disease.  Multiple cankers can girdle branches and tree trunks causing tree death.  Butternut trees are not currently protected as a threatened or endangered species under the Federal Endangered Species Act (ESA) in the United States.  However in New York State, where I live, they are classified as “Exploitably Vulnerable”, which is shorthand under for “...it is illegal for any person to pick, pluck, sever, remove, damage, or carry away any protected plant species anywhere in the state without the consent of the landowner...New York Environmental Conservation Law § 9-1503”.

 

The only good news in this two front war that the Butternut tree is in, is that the hybridized trees, called Buartnut trees, which are part Butternut and part Japanese walnut, tend to resist butternut canker infection and heal quickly if infected.  They also have the characteristic hybrid vigor, grow rapidly and don’t drop their leaves until after a killing frost, unlike butternuts, which drop their leaves two or more weeks before the first heavy frost.

 

But what did I find?  That’s a good question, with important implications for where this article goes.  It can be very difficult to tell Butternut trees from Buartnut trees, especially as they become more genetically mixed, or ‘backcrossed’, with Butternuts.  In many cases genetic testing is the only way to identify if a tree is fully Butternut, juglans cinerea. 

 

Another way is to count the nuts.  According to the USDA, Butternuts bear singly or in clusters of from 2 to 5 nuts, and Buartnut trees typically produce 8 to 15 nuts in a single cluster.  Another is to compare the shape and ridge structure of the nut. 

 

Based on the work of Purdue University it looks like what I found are Butternut, juglans cinerea, nuts.

 

So...Okay I’m not going to eat them.  If they had been hybrid Buartnut trees I would have talked about how to harvest them and use them for food.  However now in a future article, I’m going to talk about how to germinate and plant them instead.

 

I hope that you enjoy learning from this resource!  To help me to continue to provide valuable free content, please consider showing your appreciation by leaving a donation HERE.  Thank you and Happy Trails!

 

I hope that you continue to enjoy The Woodsman’s Journal Online and look for me on YouTube at BandanaMan Productions for other related videos, HERE.  Don’t forget to follow me on both The Woodsman’s Journal Online, HERE, and subscribe to BandanaMan Productions on YouTube.  If you have questions, as always, feel free to leave a comment on either site.  I announce new articles on Facebook at Eric Reynolds, on Instagram at bandanamanaproductions, and on VK at Eric Reynolds, so watch for me.

 

That is all for now, and as always, until next time, Happy Trails!

 

Sources

 

Amherst College, “Butternut (Juglans cinerea)”, https://www.amherst.edu/museums/naturalhistory/education/community-connections/amherst-college-wildlife-sanctuary/206---flora/node/803401, accessed September 12, 2026

 

International Dendrology Society, “Carya illinoinensis (Wangenh.) K. Koch”, https://www.treesandshrubsonline.org/articles/carya/carya-illinoinensis/, accessed September 12, 2026

 

Purdue University, “Forestry and Natural Resources; Identification of Butternuts and Butternut Hybrids”, FNR-420-W, https://www.extension.purdue.edu/extmedia/fnr/fnr-420-w.pdf, accessed September 19, 2026

 

USDA; “Butternut Juglans cinerea L.”, https://research.fs.usda.gov/silvics/butternut, accessed September 19, 2026

 

Wikimedia, “Juglans cinerea, Juglandaceae, Butternut, White Walnut, leaves and bark”, by H. Zell, July 13, 2009, https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Juglans_cinerea_002.JPG, accessed September 12, 2026

 

 

The Butternut, juglans cinerea ©

 

Author’s note -- I hope that you enjoy learning from this resource!  To help me to continue to provide valuable free content, please consider showing your appreciation by leaving a donation HERE.  Thank you and Happy Trails!

 

I was walking through Cazenovia Park recently when I found what I thought were wild Pecan trees, carya illinoinensis.  I would have been surprised to find Pecan trees in Western New York, since Pecans are southern trees and aren’t usually found this far north.  However the presence of Lake Erie, which is only about three miles away, sometimes skews typical growing ranges of trees and other plants. 

 

But when I started doing some research, I found that the trees I had encountered weren’t wild Pecan trees, instead they were Butternut trees, also known as White Walnut, and juglans cinerea.  My first clue were the nuts which had corrugated, linear ridges, the length of the elongated, cylindrical nut, and were surrounded by a sticky green, smooth hull, that earned it the nickname lemon-nut.  Pecan nuts are smooth and their hulls are divided into four parts.

 

The Butternut is a native hardwood related to Black Walnut, Juglans nigra, and other members of the walnut family.  Pecans and hickories belong to the exact same genus, Carya, and share the same plant family (Juglandaceae) commonly known as the walnut and hickory family.  

 

Butternut trees are medium-sized tree with alternate, pinnately compound leaves their nuts are a preferred food of squirrels and other wildlife.  Butternuts were collected and eaten by Native Americans  and early settlers, who also valued butternut for its workable, medium, brown-colored wood, and as a source of medicine, dyes, and sap sugar.

 

Don’t forget to come back next week and read “The Butternut, juglans cinerea, What To Do With It”, where we will talk about with foraged butternuts.

 

I hope that you enjoy learning from this resource!  To help me to continue to provide valuable free content, please consider showing your appreciation by leaving a donation HERE.  Thank you and Happy Trails!

 

I hope that you continue to enjoy The Woodsman’s Journal Online and look for me on YouTube at BandanaMan Productions for other related videos, HERE.  Don’t forget to follow me on both The Woodsman’s Journal Online, HERE, and subscribe to BandanaMan Productions on YouTube.  If you have questions, as always, feel free to leave a comment on either site.  I announce new articles on Facebook at Eric Reynolds, on Instagram at bandanamanaproductions, and on VK at Eric Reynolds, so watch for me.

 

That is all for now, and as always, until next time, Happy Trails!

 

 

Notes

 

Sources

 

Amherst College, “Butternut (Juglans cinerea)”, https://www.amherst.edu/museums/naturalhistory/education/community-connections/amherst-college-wildlife-sanctuary/206---flora/node/803401, accessed Sep 12, 2026

 

International Dendrology Society, “Carya illinoinensis (Wangenh.) K. Koch”, https://www.treesandshrubsonline.org/articles/carya/carya-illinoinensis/, accessed Sep 12, 2026

 

Wikimedia, “Juglans cinerea, Juglandaceae, Butternut, White Walnut, leaves and bark”, by H. Zell, July 13, 2009, https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Juglans_cinerea_002.JPG, accessed Sep 12, 2026

 

The Battle of Kingsbridge, and the Stockbridge Indian Massacre, Part Four ©

 

Author’s note -- I hope that you enjoy learning from this resource!  To help me to continue to provide valuable free content, please consider showing your appreciation by leaving a donation HERE.  Thank you and Happy Trails!

 

The road home

Estimates of the Stockbridge battle dead vary widely, some saying 17, others 37, some as many as 48 dead.  In part the confusion is because there was no certain tally of the number of warrior-soldiers in Ninham’s command, some sources say 60, others just 44 men.  This is in line with the average Patriot militia company of the American Revolutionary War, which typically enlisted between 50 to 90 men.  Also, while some members of the Stockbridge Indian Company died on the battlefield, and were easy to count, others died after fleeing the immediate battlefield, dying of their wounds with their remains not discovered in the thick woods until later, or refused quarter and being cut down out of hand, far from the main battlefield.  Some of the wounded survived the battle only to die of their wound’s days or weeks after the battle, none of these were counted among the battle dead.  Generally the higher estimates are probably the most accurate. 

 

“Several of the rebel Light Infantry and nineteen Indians were killed on the field refusing quarter, and many are supposed to have perished in the woods of their wounds.  Ninham’s son was killed...”  A Genuine account of the late affair at Kingsbridge.

 

“Refusing quarter”, this is an old term meaning to refuse to surrender.  From this phrase, one would think that the surrounded Stockbridge warriors and American light infantrymen chose to fight to the death rather than surrender.  However, in the brutal style of warfare favored by commanders like Lt. Col. Banastre, “Bloody Ban”, Tarleton, who commanded British Legion cavalry at Kingsbridge, surrender was not frequently offered, instead the cavalry cut down all those who tried to surrender.  Often “Refusing quarter”, meant simply that surrender was not offered and the cavalry killed all they could ride down, this was also known as “Tarleton’s Quarter”.

 

“Tarleton’s Quarter”, and the British Cavalry’s tendency to not taking prisoners was evident after the Battle of Kingsbridge, when some survivors of the Stockbridge Company ran down a ridge and across a small bridge over Tippet’s Brook, half a mile distant from the main battlefield.  Once on the other side, a few of them hid among the rocks and bushes of the western bank.  According to Bolton, “The cavalry being unable to scale the rocks, called upon the fugitives to surrender, promising them as a condition for so doing life and protection.  Upon this three ventured to throw themselves upon the mercy of the British Soldiers, and were immediately drawn out by the bridge and there cut to pieces”.  Because of this, well into the 19^th century, this bridge was known as the “Indian Bridge”.  Four of the fleeing Stockbridge, those who didn’t try to surrender, were able to hide in the rocks and later escape back to the American lines, beyond the Croton.

 

Daniel Ninham called out to his people to fly “...that he himself was old and would die there...” Lt. Colonel Simcoe’s account.

  

Outnumbered five to one, surrounded and ridden down by cavalry, cavalry that was not inclined to accept surrender from foot soldiers, especially when the foot soldiers were Native Americans; the Stockbridge, according to Lt. Col. Simcoe, “fought most gallantly”.

 

The Stockbridge pulled more than one cavalryman from their horses and Daniel Ninham even wounded Lt. Col, Simcoe, before being cut down by cavalryman Edward Wright, Simcoe’s Huzzar orderly.

 

According to Captain Johann Ewald, “The Indians as well as the Americans defended themselves like brave men against all sides...however, most of the enemy were killed, partly shot dead, partly cut down by the cavalry.  No Indians, especially, received quarter, including their chief called Nimham and his son, save a few”.

 

“...the Indians were killed, or desperately wounded...” Lt. Colonel Simcoe’s account.

 

According to Thomas DeVoe’s account, from The Magazine of American History with Notes and Queries, the wounded from the battle were carried to the houses of Frederick and Daniel Devoe, to have their wounds dressed and to be cared for, including “one poor Indian...having one side of his head or face cleaved down by a sabre cut almost to the chin;  here [at Daniel DeVoe’s house] he was nursed several weeks, when he was able to get away to some of his comrades north, where he finally got well, but with a face frightfully disfigured”.

 

For us Moderns, unaware of the damage sword strikes can cause, to read of an individual surviving a severe sabre cut to the face seems positively unlikely; especially given the time, the lack of antibiotics, and a lack of modern medicine. 

 

However, it is interesting to note that both period and modern doctors note that wounds caused by edged weapons, even on the head and face heal quickly and generally without problems.  As an example, the skull in the sidebar, is from a young French cavalryman, who died during 1812, and whose body, was found in a mass grave in Kaliningrad in 2006.  He’d survived a heavy sword cut to the face, which had sheared off part of his upper jaw below his nose, breaking all his front teeth and cleaving his right lower jaw in two.  Incredibly he survived anywhere from six weeks to three months, before eventually succumbing to starvation, hypothermia, typhus, or some combination of the three, during Napolean’s Retreat from Russia.

 

Many of the Stockbridge died on the battlefield, according to Thomas DeVoes account, “Others were afterwards found maimed; the old Chief Ninham, was so badly wounded that he must have soon after died; yet before his death he was able to crawl down the hill to a running brook, towards Jesse Husted’s house”.  Daniel Ninham’s body was found after the battle, when someone followed the house dogs towards the creek, to discover Ninham’s nearly devoured remains, along with the mutilated bodies of two or three more of the fallen Stockbridge.  They were buried in the ‘Indian Field’ and large stones placed on their graves, initially not as a monument, but to prevent the local dogs from digging up and further desecrating their bodies.

 

A month after the battle, the four remaining Stockbridge in service with the Continental Army, were released from service and returned to their families.  This battle wiped out an entire generation of warriors, severely weakening the Stockbridge tribe; eventually causing them lose control over their homeland unscrupulous land speculators, and were forced west, first to central New York state and the lands of the Oneida, were they formed New Stockbridge, and finally, starting in 1818, when New York State began pressuring all Native Americans to leave the state, all the way to Wisconsin, where they are today.

 

And this ends our sad chapter on The Battle of Kingsbridge, and the Stockbridge Indian Massacre, a defeat for the Patriots, a compte disaster for the Stockbridge.

 

I hope that you enjoy learning from this resource!  To help me to continue to provide valuable free content, please consider showing your appreciation by leaving a donation HERE.  Thank you and Happy Trails!

 

I hope that you continue to enjoy The Woodsman’s Journal Online and look for me on YouTube at BandanaMan Productions for other related videos, HERE.  Don’t forget to follow me on both The Woodsman’s Journal Online, HERE, and subscribe to BandanaMan Productions on YouTube.  If you have questions, as always, feel free to leave a comment on either site.  I announce new articles on Facebook at Eric Reynolds, on Instagram at bandanamanaproductions, and on VK at Eric Reynolds, so watch for me.

 

That is all for now, and as always, until next time, Happy Trails!

 

Sources

 

Bolton, Robert, Rev.; The Several Towns, Manors, and Patents of the County of Westchester, Vol II, [Chas. F. Roper, New York, 1888], page 623, https://dn790000.ca.archive.org/0/items/historyofseveral22bolt/historyofseveral22bolt.pdf, accessed August 31, 2026

 

Ewald, Johann, Captain; “A Diary of the American War: A Hession Journal”, edited and translated by Joseph P. Tustin, [Yale University, New Haven, CN, 1979], https://lindsaylegion.com/reference/library/books/1775/Ewalds%20Diary%20of%20the%20American%20War.pdf, accessed August 15, 2026

 

Hauptman, Laurence M.; “The Road to Kingsbridge: Daniel Nimham and the Stockbridge Indian Company in the American Revolution”, American Indian Magazine, Fall 2017 / Vol. 18 No. 3, https://www.americanindianmagazine.org/story/road-kingsbridge-daniel-nimham-and-stockbridge-indian-company-american-revolution, accessed August 22, 2026

 

National Park Service; “The Stockbridge Militia and the Battle of Van Cortlandt’s Woods”, https://www.nps.gov/mava/learn/historyculture/the-stockbridge-militia-and-the-battle-of-van-cortlandt-s-woods.htm, accessed August 12, 2026

 

New York City Cemetery Project; “Stockbridge Indian Burial Ground”, March 1, 2022, https://nycemetery.wordpress.com/tag/native-american-cemeteries/, accessed August 12, 2026

 

Rees, John U; “ ‘On command with Nimham Indian Capt.’: Jabez Pottage, Indigenous Connecticut Soldier”, https://www.academia.edu/143455426/_On_command_with_Nimham_Indian_Capt_Jabez_Pottage_Indigenous_Connecticut_Soldier_?auto=download, accessed August 31, 2026

 

Rees, John U; “Richard Walling, ‘Patriots Blood The Indian Company of 1778’ ”, https://www.academia.edu/125746909/Richard_Walling_Patriots_Blood_The_Indian_Company_of_1778_, accessed August 31, 2026

 

Rees, John U; “ ‘The bones of those who have been killed in the war’: Biography of Jehoiakim Mtohksin, Stockbridge War Chief”, https://www.academia.edu/125518736/_The_bones_of_those_who_have_been_killed_in_the_war_Biography_of_Jehoiakim_Mtohksin_Stockbridge_War_Chief_, accessed August 31, 2026

 

Rindfleisch, Bryan; “The Stockbridge-Mohican Community, 1775-1783”, February 3, 2016, February 3, 2016, https://allthingsliberty.com/2016/02/the-stockbridge-mohican-community-1775-1783/, accessed August 15, 2026

 

The Magazine of American History with Notes and Queries, Volume V, “The Massacre of the Stockbridge Indians 1778”, [A.S. Barnes and Co., New York and Chicago, 1880], page 185 to 195, https://books.google.com/books?id=EFkbYbpRHDcC&pg=PA195&source=gbs_toc_r&cad=2#v=onepage&q&f=false, accessed August 22, 2026

 

Vergano, Dan; “A French Soldier Died After A Saber Wound In 1812. Scientists Have Now Rebuilt His Face”, Buzzfeed, January 21, 2019, https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/danvergano/war-of-1812-soldier-face-reconstruction, accessed September 4, 2026