Pecan

pecan: see hickory.

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pecan

Pecan (Carya illinoinensis)

(credit: Grant Heilman)

Nut and tree (Carya illinoinensis) of the walnut family, native to temperate North America. Occasionally reaching a height of about 160 ft (50 m), the tree has deeply furrowed bark and feather-shaped leaves. Pecan nut meat, rich and distinctive in flavour and texture, has one of the highest fat contents of any vegetable product and a caloric value close to that of butter. Pecan production is a considerable industry of the southeastern U.S., where pecan pie and pecan praline candy are traditional sweets.

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pecan

1. a hickory tree, Carya pecan (or C. illinoensis), of the southern US, having deeply furrowed bark and edible nuts

2. the smooth oval nut of this tree, which has a sweet oily kernel

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pecan [pi′kän]

(botany)

Carya illinoensis.A large deciduous hickory tree in the order Fagales which produces an edible, oblong, thin-shelled nut.

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Pecan 

(Carya illinoensis, formerly known as C. olivaeformis or C. pecan), a tree of the family Juglandaceae. The trunk grows to a height of 50 m and a diameter of 2–2.5 m. The bark is deeply furrowed. The leaves, which are alternate, large, and odd pinnate, consist of 11 to 17 oblong-lanceolate serrate leaflets. The staminate flowers are in pendulous multiflorous, three-branched catkins, which are on shoots from the previous year. Two to 12 pistillate flowers develop on the ends of the young shoots. The fruit is a nut, which is 3.5–8 cm long and has a fleshy, leathery husk. Upon ripening, the husk becomes woody and separates into four valves. The seeds are edible and contain up to 70 percent oil.

The pecan grows in southeastern North America in forests and river valleys. It has long been cultivated for its nuts. In the USSR the tree is raised in the Caucasus and, less often, in the Ukraine and Middle Asia.

REFERENCES

Derev’ia i kustarniki SSSR, vol. 2. Moscow-Leningrad, 1951.
Orekhoplodnye drevesnye porody. Moscow, 1969.