How to use pecan shells

I have an abundance of pecan shells.  What are your thoughts on using 'some' of them in hugelkulture style raised garden beds?  What other uses are there for them?

Bonnie

I have read of using pecan shells as mulch but I don't have first hand knowledge. I do however like to encourage people to use what is local and cheap.

there’s a possibility of some amount of juglone in shells hulls, wood, and leaves of any Carya species, including pecans. unless the bed/hugel is intended for growing only plants that are resistant to the effects of juglone, i would personally steer away from using them there. instead i would mulch juglone-tolerant plants with them.

I would use them in a smoker to get pecan smoked meat.

The mulch idea sounds good too.

Compost some to see how that works out.

Hugelkulture beds, too.

Hi Bonnie,
I've heard of walnut shells being crushed into powder and then added to soap mix to make a more scrubby soap. I wonder if you could do the same with pecan shells?

Years ago I gardened in close proximity to a large pecan orchard and had access to truckloads of shells every year.  I would use them everywhere as a long-term mulch, similar to the ways one would use wood chips, and never noticed any ill effect, such as from juglone. (I also had access to plenty of old hay, straw, and peanut shells also, but these I would use in more short-term, annual plantings)  Eventually I learned to pile them in the chicken pen and let the chickens go through them first....fresh shells always contain some bits of "missed" nuts, and then move them again later.  But one of the best uses was to simply pile them somewhere out of the way and let them slowly compost, perhaps encouraged by occasional doses of urine.  Within five years or so it was basically like black potting soil...

If biochar is anything you are interested in, I would use some of them for that.  It seems like they would be a great size and you wouldn't need to crush them.  Crushing is the worst step in my mind.