gotcha.

yeah, these mature ones seem to drop a lot of branches. I harvest the big ones for firewood.

If they weren't planted then most likely you'll get the tiny hard pecans that are too much work to eat. The big fat ones that you buy in a bag and cook with come from grafted trees which grows pecans that aren't native to the area. It's pretty good BBQ wood, so all is not lost.

They do prefer deep soil and lots of water. My neighborhood is a former pecan bottom on the Colorado arm of lake LBJ. The pecans on the lake front lots do best and there are a few neighbors with grafted tress who will have more pecans than they can pick up on a good year.

Pecan trees look perfectly healthy. For pecan tree general health focus on small branches size of your index finger. How much did they grow this year, how many died back from drought or freeze.

Loss of very large limbs is common due to high winds. Big man-killer limbs will readily break, usually hanging in tree until next big wind.

Nut crop is based on stored carbohydrates. That is dependent on water availability March- October, nutrients primarily nitrogen, and crop load. If a heavy crop occurs it exhausts carbohydrates and tree may skip 1-6 years until adequate reserves are developed.

Each seed grown pecan tree has unique genetics so will drop leaves at different times.

If you manage natives the same as improved varieties they can have tremendous reliable productions.
As a minimum keep it shredded under tree once or twice a year - or heavily grazed to reduce grass competition.

Also if you fertilize a hay meadow with Urea in April or May make a few passes around those pecans every year.

A native pecan at 80 nuts a pound usually are all filled out and have high oil content so find a ready commercial market for confectionery pecans. Unfortunately Mexico is flooding market with cheaper nuts do prices have been very depressed.

Almost every critter eats pecans. Also they go for best quality nuts first. Highest oil content with thinnest shell. Wait until a big flock of crows takes up in orchard, literally amazing how fast they strip a tree. Or few dozen coons. Pack of Wild hogs will clean up hundreds of pounds in a week. I've seen cows literally eat themselves sick on pecans.

I raised both grafted and improved pecans commercially since 1990 and growing up learned about native pecans in my dad's 180 acre native pecan farm.