Most of the nuts were empty apart from some fibrous brown material and dust. Some contained fat maggots. Some contained rather shrivelled nuts. A few contained decent nuts.
So the nuts which had started out OK had either been eaten or had shrunk away. The first problem might be why nuts you buy in shops have usually been kiln dried, a process which maybe kills both eggs and maggots, the remains of which are perhaps not noticed when you eat the nut some time later. The second problem might be why most commercial nuts are grown in hot countries, or at least countries with hot summers, where they ripen faster and have lower water content, and so shrink less on both counts. Oddly, I do not remember maggots in nuts from childhood at all: raspberries and peas yes, but not nuts. Also oddly, it was only this morning that YouGov was asking whether I went in for gathering food from hedgerows. I think this was in the context of a list of rather unusual hobbies - but I have no idea who would have paid them to ask.
All rather off-putting, so the remaining nuts, maybe half of what I picked in the first place, are now in the compost heap.
But I thought I would ask google about nut pests, and the most comprehensive summary comes from the government of Ontario, although both Oregon and Australia express interest. Filbert worms and filbert weevils both look quite like our maggots, but neither pest seems to come to Europe.
Sadly, the IX International Congress on the Hazelnut, held in Turkey, clashed with our visit to Bognor Regis. But hopefully they will publish their proceedings in due course, one of the RHS libraries will get a print copy and I will be able to bottom out the matter of the maggots.
Reference 1: http://psmv3.blogspot.co.uk/2017/08/nut-report.html.
Reference 2: http://www.omafra.gov.on.ca/english/crops/facts/12-009.htm.
Reference 3: http://www.hazelnut2017.org/.
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