14 April: National Pecan Day

Today is National Pecan Day, so some nutty facts for you!

1. The botanical name for the pecan tree is Carya illinoinensis. The word pecan derives from an Algonquian word meaning any nut which requires a stone to crack it.
2. The pecan tree is a large deciduous tree, growing to 20–40 m (66–131 ft) in height, and can live for up to 300 years. They produce fruit every other year. As with many types of nut, pecans aren't nuts but drupes - fruit with a pit, surrounded by a husk.
3. The trees are native to the USA, which produces 80-95% of the world's crop. There are more than ten million pecan trees in America. Georgia is the state which produces most of them, followed by Texas, New Mexico, Arizona, Louisiana, and Oklahoma. San Saba, Texas claims to be "The Pecan Capital of the World", as does Albany, Georgia.
4. The pecan is the state nut of Alabama and the state tree of Texas.
5. There are over a thousand different varieties of pecan. Many are named for Native American Indian tribes, such as Cheyenne, Mohawk, Sioux, Choctaw and Shawnee, but you'll also find 'Stuart', 'Schley', 'Desirable' and 'Elliot'.
6. The first people to enjoy pecans were, of course, Native Americans, but the explorers and settlers who came to the New World soon caught on. Spanish explorers called pecans nuez de la arruga, meaning "wrinkle nut".
7. Thomas Jefferson grew pecans in his orchard at home, and he gave some to George Washington, who planted them. Later on, Roasted pecan shells were a common coffee substitute in Civil War rations. In the modern age, pecans went to the moon on two of the Apollo space missions.
8. In 1906, Texas Governor James Stephen Hogg asked for a pecan tree to be planted on his grave instead of a headstone and that the seeds it produced should be distributed around the state to make Texas a "Land of Trees".
9. Pecans contain Vitamin A, Vitamin E, folic acid, calcium, magnesium, several B vitamins, Potassium and Zinc. They also contain compounds that help prevent the build up of cholesterol.
10. As well as the fruit, the wood of the pecan tree has many uses. Furniture, flooring, agricultural implements, Baseball bats, hammer handles, furniture, wall panelling, flooring, religious carvings, and firewood for smoking meat. The torches for the 1996 Olympic Games in Atlanta has handles made from pecan wood.

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