Has anyone else noticed zero beech mast (nuts) this year?

I walked through our local park today hoping to find conkers but didn't.
There was some beech mast but not a lot.

Not seen beech nuts. There are conkers and hundreds of sweet chestnuts. We have to keep the dog away because they’re so thick on the ground, and so prickly.

winterwhite

Not beech nuts, but no conkers😖

I was walking along a path behind a local primary school. The ground was littered with conkers, I couldn't get over them just being left. When my kids were at that school there would have been crowds of kids trying to get as many as they could.

Lots of beech mast and conkers here just now. NE Scotland.

We have a very big beech tree in our garden, it's approximately 250 years old. This year no flowers so no nuts, but it does seem to go in cycles; perhaps because it's had plenty of water this year it isn't feeling the need to procreate, as it were.

We had a beech tree in the grounds of our school. We girls did try nibbling them then someone suggested if we ate enough we could make ourselves sick enough to miss the Maths lesson.

I don't think anyone did!

👍 🙂

Allira

^and last year was a bonanza^

That was the mast year AreWeThereYet. Then the tree will have a rest for the next one or two years.

Trees of the same species have a mast year at the same time, I think.

You're right, I wrote it backwards. Thanks.

and last year was a bonanza

That was the mast year AreWeThereYet. Then the tree will have a rest for the next one or two years.

Trees of the same species have a mast year at the same time, I think.

Very little of anything where I walk Little Dog - few acorns, no sloes and someone has already taken what unripe hazelnuts there were.
In the garden, I’ve had no pears at all this year and no apples on one of my trees. The others aren’t what you’d call laden either.

rockgran when I cut the grass in the autumn I have to wear a straw hat to stop the conkers from hitting me on the head from 2 very large trees. This year not so many but just as hard and painful!

We've almost finished clearing up the acorns out the front this year, absolutely loads of them. Some hazel nuts, but not as many as usual. I have seen conkers around but not as many as usual.

The year before last there we had no acorns (mast year), and last year was a bonanza. So far this year we've filled three of the big brown garden refuse bins with almost all acorns from the front garden. The bins get really heavy and hard to move, and I've seen the waste collectors open the bins and rifle through them to see what was in there 😄 Leaves next...

Our local conker tree has had loads of nuts this year. They were falling around me like raindrops when I went to collect a few. One hit me and it hurt! (Yorkshire).

They wanted us to get it pretty drastically reduced, but it’s protected, so all the tree officer would allow was some thinning. Which we agreed to - if they paid half of the several hundred £ cost, but they declined.

You did your best, witz. Oh well, at least you're getting a season's relief from beech mast. I wonder of your neighbours will bring up the thinning subject again 😅

It’s right in a corner, Baggs, and one major branch was lopped decades ago, so more of it overhangs next door’s garden, which is even smaller. They used to complain a lot about the tree - especially when squirrels were dropping a billion beech nut shells on their decking!
But then the tree was there when they chose to buy the house.

They wanted us to get it pretty drastically reduced, but it’s protected, so all the tree officer would allow was some thinning. Which we agreed to - if they paid half of the several hundred £ cost, but they declined.

I am hiding 😂

Should add, lots of acorns in our woods.

Plenty of sweet chestnuts in our woods but very small this year. However, where our local lanes are usually a rich hunting ground for hazel nuts most years, there were none this year - haven’t seen any nibbled ones on the ground either. I have seen conkers, though and plenty of empty shells.

Most trees have both male and female flowers and are mainly wind pollinated, though conker trees do need insects to do the job. The very wet spring would I imagine reduce wind pollination.

Our lime tree has been VERY productive this year, never seen so many seeds before - think they do go in cycles but this year is exceptional.

We managed to find some conkers a couple weeks ago (early this year?) and I have noticed dropped acorns on the patio a few times recently. No idea where they are coming from, I don't know of any oak trees near us, never had them before.
I was looking at some hazel bushes last week, nothing on there.

There is a large beech tree in the cemetery along the road from here, usually drops loads on the pavement. But I don't walk out that way now.

I certainly remember a couple of years ago, an absolute mass of acorns from a neighbour’s tree all over a footpath - the following year, virtually none.
I suppose trees do now and then have years when they’re conserving their energy….

Baggs

It must fill a good deal of your small garden, witz! The mature beech trees near us are absolutely gigantic!

I'll go and check them out sometime. What I have noticed this years is tonnages of sycamore mast. Even in an ordinary year there's a lot but this year is extraordinary.

I suppose trees do have mast producing cycles. I wonder if their production follows a Normal Distribution" curve over a number of years?

I wondered if last year was a mast year?

Our neighbour seemed to be sweeping up an enormous amount of beech nuts last year; I haven't looked this year but haven't noticed many in the road so far.

Not sure about beech nuts, but our 2 horse chestnuts have produced very few conkers. In one way thank goodness as it's one hell of a job raking them up and the garden rubbish bin gets almost too heavy to push. But on the other hand it's a bit worrying. No pollinators this year?? The wet spring?
I will still have the leaves of course to rake up, but they aren't so heavy and I can leave them in piles on the flower beds for a while without fear of thousands of sprouting horse chestnuts plants.

I have no conkers this year and a very poor apple crop. Wet summer and lack of pollinators.