Scroll down to see more
Andrey Shapran
The pine nut harvest begins in late July or early August and lasts around two months, while in mountainous regions the season starts much later.
Andrey Shapran
Pine nuts do not thrive every year, and a good harvest happens approximately once every four years.
Andrey Shapran
Pine nuts are the most important grain in the food chain, which links almost all living species in the Taiga. All wild beasts — from mice to bears — are ultimately dependent on them in one form or another.
Andrey Shapran
The work of pine nut gatherers is toilsome. They live in dugouts or pitch tents. It gets cold at night, and a stove is a necessity.
Andrey Shapran
Ripe pine cones readily fall to the ground when the branch is struck or shaken.
Andrey Shapran
Cones are sometimes gathered by striking the trunk of the cedar with a large wooden mallet. But this method poses a risk to the tree, and in Altai, where cedars are worshipped, it is generally avoided.
Andrey Shapran
The technique of peeling pines and sifting the seed (nuts) has been mastered over the centuries and has remained practically unchanged in all this time. Only the cone grinder is now mechanical. Cones used to be crushed and crumbled using wooden grooved mashers.
Andrey Shapran
The husk is poured out of the crusher together with the nuts, and the grain must be separated from the chaff. This is done using a special type of sieve in the shape of a trough with holes of such diameter.
Andrey Shapran
Nuts inside pine seed heads keep for a long time, but gatherers try to shell them on site, since the nut makes up no more than 20 percent of the weight of the cone.
Andrey Shapran
Some of the harvest is sold as cones, inside sacks. Nuts are extracted from the remaining cones.
Andrey Shapran
After processing, five sacks of cones produce one bag of nuts.
Andrey Shapran
Nuts can be sold to dealers at a much higher price than cones. But it takes more elbow grease to produce them.
