Hi there. We've got a mature walnut tree on our
land. I'm in the process of making a bunch of black walnut stain, so I'm cracking in to all the walnuts that have fallen in the recent windy spell. I'm finding that nearly all of them are just full to bursting with tiny little white
maggots. See the attached photo.
So my questions are:
1. It's this walnut curculio? Walnut husk fly? Something else? How can you tell?
2. In future years, how would I prevent this parasitism from bring so ubiquitous without using toxic chemicals? What eats these flows? I need something that eats the hell out of them. Bats? Birds? We have a bunch of birds, low on bats, but planning to build a ton of
bat houses.
3. Will the walnuts be worth drying and eating based on the presence of these bugs? Don't particularly want to waste my time, know what I mean?
Thank you right kindly!