doublegunshop.com - home Forums General Discussion DIY Gunsmithing @ doublegunshop.com Imported French walnut

Does anyone know when the supply of french grown walnut dried up?

Your question implies that French walnut is no longer available, and that isn't the case. It isn't as common as it once was. Many gunmakers used tons of it, especially the French and Belgians. Military rifles for two world wars consumed a lot of it. L.C.Smith guns also were mainly stocked with French walnut. What is referred to as French walnut is the species Juglans Regia, that is grown in France. But the same species is grown many other places and has a number of other common names including English, Circassian, Turkish, Italian, etc. Different soils, climates, and growing growing conditions give the wood different characteristics such as color and mineral streaking. And sometimes you may see California grown walnut referred to as French or English or whatever the seed source was.

Some people refer to Bastogne walnut as French, but it is a hybrid cross of English and Claro walnut, and was first bred in the U.S., not the Bastogne region of France. Walnut trees still grow in France, but like walnut everywhere, demand has outpaced supply, and the prices have risen considerably. No other wood has so many desirable characteristics for gunstocks as Juglans Regia... no matter what we call it. So it will never be as inexpensive as it was decades ago. But as long as there is a demand for walnut, it will continue to be grown and harvested... even the French variety.

As an aside, one of my best buys for gunstock blanks was a lot of French walnut blanks I bought on Ebay about 10 years ago, for the starting bid of $10.00 for four two piece blanks. I mis-typed my search as "Frech walnut", and the seller also used the same misspelling of "Frech" when he listed them. Apparently, no one else saw the listing because of the error, so I got them for the starting bid price of $2.50 each. They were very dense and nicely figured and laid out very well, and he even sent me four extra forend blanks. I believe they were California grown, but they had the light coloring that is common in French walnut.

Keith, I know what Juglans Regia is, I want to know when the French imported stuff stopped coming into the country, because I just won a blank on eBay that is marked "made in france" with a seal stamped into it. I am wondering how old the blank is.

What makes you think that walnut from France is no longer imported into the U.S.? It's a pain to post a link with my phone, but a quick search turned up 16 French hardwood suppliers and exporters from frenchtimber.com

Another quick search turned up 87 timber and lumber companies in France. The Rhone-Alpes area of France produces an annual average of 18,000 metric tons of thin shell walnuts, and the southwest region produced 38,500 metric tons of walnuts in 2015. France is second only to Romania in European walnut production, and France is 7th in the world for walnut production. Just as in California, when you grow mature walnut trees for nut production, eventually they are harvested for their lumber. And so long as there is demand, more will be planted. Since there is no restriction on imports of French walnut wood into the U.S. that I am aware of, I'd bet you can send them your dollars and they will sell you their wood and their nuts.

Anyone recognize this stamp?

I bought several pieces of Tesssier french about 30 years ago. Beautiful stuff. I had three blanks and one is worn by my custom Fox, another I sold and the last is a perfect rifle blank and is going on a left hand G33-40 7mm X 57 from GMA.

I have not seen much true, high quality French walnut for over 20 years here in the US. The Brits bought (still buy?) a lot of it, but even they are going to Turkish now, I think, for new blanks.

Wood from irrigated nut trees is usually not that great... the best seems to come from shade trees planted over a century ago.

You might shop around the UK for blanks?

Every time I go to the SW of France, I stop at a specialized sawmill in Dordogne.
Pickings are slim. My last trip only yielded one OK blank.
The suitable trees are getting very scarce. They have to come from poor (ground-wise) areas (hill top). There is little to no figure from the Valley trees, which are much more plentiful and grow much faster.
Both Wars took a huge toll on the supply.
My gut feeling is that the way the Turks go, they'll run out of trees very quickly.
Best regards,
WC-

I'm bringing this old thread back to the top because I was bothered by the idea that France might actually be on the verge of having no more French Walnut with grain and figure suitable for nice custom gun stocks. I have to believe that even today, this spring, some new trees will be planted that are not nut plantation trees. And 100 years from now, they may be harvested and if guns are still legal, they may be utilized for gun stocks. Then, this evening, I happened across the website of a French Lumber Company that still sells the real deal. Get it while you can... or wait 100 years for the trees that are being planted today.

https://www.labarbarie.com/categorie-produit/crosse-fusils/

And here's an English language page from the same company that says they began planting trees specifically for wood production due to concerns that the high grade lumber was disappearing.

https://www.labarbarie.com/int/

Walnut is a renewable resource. Spring is coming. Do your part and plant some Juglans Regia trees for your great grandchildren.

Close to 40 years ago, I was reading an article that covered the profits that could be realized by planting a 10 acre plot of Juglans Regia trees and harvesting, if memory serves, after about 50 years.

I was in AK at the time and mentioned this to my dad who has plenty of land here in ID. His response was "hell I'll be dead before they can be harvested and who's going to take care of them." He never did plant the 10 acres but it evidently piqued his interest, because he ended up planting about 5-6 trees, which are now getting fairly large and producing an excellent nut crop every year.

I have a seedling English walnut in my front yard. I planted it About 12 years ago never thinking it would survive. It's about 15 feet tall now and 8" diameter at the base. I told myself I was growing stock blanks. I'm 78 and figure I only have to live another 90 years to see a return. In the meantime, however, it's a beautiful tree and produced a crop of two nuts last year.