Comanche's Pecans Look Fine From the Outside This Year. Crack a Handful Before You Pick Up the Rest.

The shucks are splitting and the first nuts are dropping into the grass under the big trees around Comanche. They look the way pecans always look this time of year: brown, striped, heavy enough in the hand. This year that look tells you less than usual. A pecan's outside was finished long before August. The part you eat was still being built during the hottest, driest weeks of the summer.

So start the season small. Pick up twenty nuts, crack them at the kitchen table, and see what's inside before you put a tarp under every tree on the place.

What August did inside the shell

Monte Nesbitt, the pecan specialist with Texas A&M AgriLife Extension, spelled out the problem in a September 1, 2026 report from AgriLife Today. A hot, extremely dry stretch hit just as trees went into kernel fill. That's the August-to-September window when the edible part of the nut develops and the tree needs the most water.

"The dry weather we're having now is impacting the development of kernel," Nesbitt told AgriLife Today. "Shriveled, malformed kernels can hide inside normal-looking shells."

The spring set things up differently. An unusually wet spring across North, East and Central Texas meant many orchards needed little irrigation into July. The same moisture brought pecan scab, downy spot and powdery mildew, and growers also dealt with above-normal pecan nut casebearer pressure. Then the rain quit right when the trees needed it most.

Statewide, the numbers still look decent. As of that September report, Nesbitt put the 2026 Texas crop at around 39 million pounds, up from 32 million pounds in 2025. The Tri-State Pecan Growers Association estimate came in closer to 42 million. Those totals count pounds of nuts. They don't tell you how full the kernels are.

Why the orchard crop and the yard crop may not match

Nesbitt's line that matters most for Comanche is this one: "Growers with reliable irrigation have a good chance of finishing the crop while those without water face some uncertainty." He called August "the separating point where pecans can go well, or they go badly."

The same report's West Central district summary, which takes in this part of the state, described highs above 100 degrees every day, pastures brown and wilting, and small stock tanks running low and muddy. Pecan orchards were "holding their own, though supplemental water was important during nut filling."

The Comanche County Extension office sounded upbeat in its October is Pecan Month column in The Comanche Chief. It said that "despite a very tough August and September, the pecan crop on managed acres looks well," adding that some improved varieties will be harvested, the quality looks good, and new-crop pecans will be available soon.

That good report covers managed acres, the commercial orchards that make this county a pecan county. A native tree in a pasture corner, or the big pecan shading a backyard on the east side of town, got whatever August gave it, and AgriLife's guidance puts trees without water in the "uncertainty" group. Some of those trees will still bear a fine crop. You just can't know which ones from the ground.

The stakes are bigger here than in most places. The same Extension column says that "with nut sales averaging 18 to 24 million yearly, Comanche County is one of the top counties in the U.S. for pecan production." In a county where pecans are that big a business, a lot of people are about to spend October weekends bent over under a tree.

A ten-minute check before the tarp goes down

The Texas Pecan Growers Association's 2025 pecan show handbook is written for judging, but its basics work just as well at the kitchen table.

1. Wait for the shucks to split. That's the handbook's signal that it's time to harvest.
2. Gather a fair sample from each tree. Pick up nuts from all around the canopy, not only the biggest ones on top of the pile. Judges work from a representative sample, and so should you.
3. Let them dry. The handbook calls for drying until moisture is below 5 percent, or until the kernel snaps when you bend it. A kernel that bends without breaking needs more time.
4. Crack every nut in the sample. Look for the "pops," the hollow nuts the handbook says to separate from the sound ones. Look for the shriveled and malformed kernels Nesbitt warned about.
5. Weigh it if you want a real number. Judges figure edible-kernel percentage by shelling the sample and weighing the good kernels. A kitchen scale gets you close enough to compare one tree with another.

Do this for each tree, not once for the whole place. Two trees fifty yards apart can come out very differently if one sits near a tank or a low spot that held moisture longer. If one tree comes back full and another comes back mostly pops, you've just learned where your October hours belong.

Where new-crop pecans show up in town

If the backyard sample is disappointing, the managed orchards the Extension office is pleased with sell close to home. AgriLife's Nesbitt expects retail pecan prices to rise slightly this year along with broader food inflation, and he notes more Texas growers have been moving to direct-to-consumer sales.

Sorrells Farms describes itself as a Comanche County operation of more than 1,200 acres, where the yearly pecan harvest is one of the big jobs of fall. Durham-Ellis runs a large processing operation off the highway. None of these stores posts a 2026 opening day for new crop, and AgriLife says Texas harvest starts in October at the earliest. A phone call will tell you whether this year's nuts are on the shelf yet.

Getting your own nuts cracked

A good sample means a pile of in-shell pecans and a long winter with a nutcracker, unless somebody cracks them for you. None of the Comanche stores above advertises custom cracking for the public online. The Texas Pecan Growers Association's where-to-buy directory does list operations elsewhere in the state that crack and shell for people with their own trees, but they're hours away. Before you load the truck, call the local shops and ask whether they crack customer nuts this season, what it costs, and whether they take small lots.

If the sample comes back full

A tree that came through August with good kernels is worth showing off. Comanche County Extension holds a county pecan show each winter. The 2025 show announcement in The Comanche Chief set judging for Thursday, December 18, at the Extension office, with no entry fee. Growers entered current-year nuts from their own trees, at least 50 per entry, labeled with the variety and contact details. Native and seedling entries had no limit. Watch the Comanche County Extension office for the 2026 date and rules.

The same announcement offered advice that fits the sampling above: gather nuts right after they drop, pick uniform nuts from a tree carrying a lighter crop where you can, keep each sample to one variety, and refrigerate it until entry. That means your best nuts from this month can sit in the refrigerator until December.

For a show already on the 2026 calendar, the Abilene Area Pecan Show runs December 9 at 1:30 p.m. at the Taylor County Extension Office, 1982 Lytle Way in Abilene. Nut Division entries are accepted November 16 through December 7, and a Baking Division takes entries December 8 from 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. If the kernels are only good enough for pie, there's a division for that too.

Native pecans along a creek bottom count for something on a piece of land in this county. If you're weighing pecan ground in Comanche County, or wondering what the trees on your own place add to it, Ridge Tex Realty is glad to walk it with you. Contact Us.