Walnut, Iowa
9 topographic sheets cover this place, the earliest surveyed in 1954 and the latest in 1985. It stands in Layton Township. It lies in ZIP code area 51577. The Survey maps it on the Walnut quadrangle. 747 people lived here at the 2020 count. It stands 1,332 feet above sea level.
On record in Walnut
Buildings and businesses the archive holds for this place. Each opens its own page, with the source record it came from.
On the National Register 2 records
German Bank Building of Walnut, Iowalisted 1991- Masonic Temple of Walnutlisted 2026
Population over time
2 figuresWalnut fell from 785 to 747 between 2010 and 2020. These are the recorded population figures Wikidata holds for this place, reached through the Geographic Names Information System number this page is keyed on rather than by name, so they belong to this place and not to another of the same name. Most are census counts, but not all are: an early figure may be a founding or settlement estimate, and an estimate published within five years of a census is left out. The change column is computed, and is left blank where more than 20 years separate a figure from the one before it, because a gap that long is not a change between two counts.
| Year | People | Change |
|---|---|---|
| 2010 | 785 | |
| 2020 | 747 | -38 (-5%) |
Topographic sheets covering this place
5 surveys from 9 printed sheetsMatched by testing this settlement's coordinate against the published boundary of every sheet in the United States Geological Survey's historical collection. Each opens the scanned sheet at the Survey.
- 1954 USGS Omaha quadrangle1:250000, 3 printings
- 1957 USGS Omaha quadrangle1:250000
- 1958 USGS Omaha quadrangle1:250000, 2 printings
- 1971 USGS Walnut quadrangle1:24000
- 1985 USGS Omaha quadrangle1:100000, 2 printings
Fires near this place
3 since 2014Regional context, not property-specific evidence. The federal wildfire occurrence database lists 3 fires within 5 miles of Walnut between 2014 and 2017, burning about 38 acres in total. None started naturally. None was recorded as arson. Distance is straight-line from the map coordinates, so a fire counted here may appear on a neighbouring settlement's page as well.
| Reported cause | Fires |
|---|---|
| Debris and open burning | 2 |
| Equipment and vehicle use | 1 |
The most recent of them, most recent first, with the day each was reported and the service that recorded it.
| Date | Cause | Size | Reported by | Name on the report |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 22 March 2017 | Debris and open burning | 20 acres | Iowa Department of Natural Resources | not named |
| 20 March 2014 | Equipment and vehicle use | 10 acres | Iowa Department of Natural Resources | not named |
| 15 March 2015 | Debris and open burning | 7.5 acres | Iowa Department of Natural Resources | not named |
Settlements close enough to share some of these fires:
Storms near this place
27 since 1999Regional context, not property-specific evidence. The National Weather Service names Walnut in 27 storm reports between 1999 and 2025: 12 hail, 11 thunderstorm wind, 2 tornado, 1 funnel cloud. No death or injury is recorded in these reports. Each account below is quoted exactly as the forecast office filed it, from the NOAA Storm Events Database, and each date opens the federal record of that event.
| When | Event | Place named | Harm | What the report says |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| April 2025 | Thunderstorm Wind | Walnut | - | Personal weather station measured gust of 60 mph, likely due to the evaporating of anvil precipitation helping to mix down a strong low-level jet. |
| May 2024 | Thunderstorm Wind | Walnut | - | The office received a report from the public of an empty grain bin that had been blown off its foundation. |
| May 2023 | Hail | Walnut | - | Public reported 1-inch hail. |
| June 2023 | Hail | Walnut | - | Trained spotter reported quarter size hail. |
| August 2023 | Heavy Rain | Walnut | - | Broadcast media relayed a report from the public of nearly 7-inches of rain just south of Walnut and that it was still raining heavily at the time. |
| April 2022 | Hail | Walnut | - | Trained Spotter reported 1 inch hail. |
| July 2021 | Thunderstorm Wind | Walnut | - | Iowa State University research station measured a peak wind gust of 62 mph. |
| July 2021 | Thunderstorm Wind | Walnut | - | Iowa mesonet site measured a peak wind gust of 61 mph. |
| April 2018 | Hail | Walnut | - | Quarter size hail reported 1 mile west of Walnut. |
| June 2018 | Thunderstorm Wind | Walnut | - | Large tree limbs blown down in Walnut and one semi-truck blown off of I-80 north of Walnut. |
| July 2011 | Thunderstorm Wind | Walnut | - | Thunderstorms wind gusts estimated at over 60 mph uprooted several trees and destroyed a barn east of Walnut. Corn was flattened in the area as well. |
| June 2008 | Hail | Walnut | - | Hail up to 1 inch in diameter fell for about 5 minutes in Walnut. |
| June 2005 | Thunderstorm Wind | Walnut | - | Thunderstorm wind gusts estimated at 60 mph downed some limbs near Walnut. |
| May 2004 | Thunderstorm Wind | Walnut | - | Thunderstorm wind gusts estimated at 70 mph blew a truck over on Interstate 80 just north of Walnut. This was from the same storm that produced the tornado that tracked across this area around the same time, and it could have been from rear flank downdraft winds wrapping around the tornado. |
| May 2004 | Thunderstorm Wind | Walnut | - | Thunderstorm wind gusts estimated at over 60 mph destroyed a barn 5 miles south of Walnut. This was from the same storm that produced the tornado that lifted just to the northwest of this damage report. |
| June 2000 | Funnel Cloud | Walnut | - | Reported by ham radio operator near Walnut. |
| August 2000 | Thunderstorm Wind | Walnut | - | Thunderstorm wind gust estimated at around 60 mph by a ham radio operator. |
| July 2000 | Tornado (F0) | Walnut | - | A brief touchdown of a very narrow and short-lived tornado. The storm spotter that reported it said it appeared and then dissipated in a matter of 15 or 20 seconds, "it was very snake-like in appearance" according to the spotter. |
| June 1999 | Thunderstorm Wind | Walnut | - | Tree limbs up to a foot in diameter were downed plus shingles blown off a roof. |
| June 2014 | Hail | Walnut | - | no account filed |
| June 2014 | Hail | Walnut | - | no account filed |
| March 2006 | Hail | Walnut | - | no account filed |
| May 2004 | Tornado (F1) | Walnut | - | no account filed |
| August 2003 | Hail | Walnut | - | no account filed |
| May 2001 | Hail | Walnut | - | no account filed |
| August 2000 | Hail | Walnut | - | no account filed |
| July 2000 | Hail | Walnut | - | no account filed |
Nearest settlements
The eight closest, with where each one stands in the county. Distances are straight-line, computed from the Geographic Names Information System coordinates.
| Map | Place | Distance | Sheets |
|---|---|---|---|
| Avoca | 6.2 miles | 10 | |
| Newtown (historical) | 6.3 miles | 10 | |
| Harlan Junction (historical) | 7.6 miles | 10 | |
| Hancock | 9.6 miles | 10 | |
| Iola (historical) | 13.0 miles | 9 | |
| Oakland | 14.9 miles | 9 | |
| Minden | 17.0 miles | 11 | |
| York Center | 19.0 miles | 11 |
Elsewhere
Matched on this settlement's Geographic Names Information System number rather than its name, so it cannot be a different place of the same name in another state.
| Wikipedia article on Walnut | An encyclopaedic summary. Its text is share-alike, so it is linked here rather than copied. |
| Wikidata item Q2240007 | The structured record the population and elevation above come from. Public domain (CC0). |
Provenance
This settlement is recorded in the Geographic Names Information System as feature 462626. The sheet list is computed by point-in-boundary test against the United States Geological Survey's historical topographic inventory. Both are works of the United States government and carry no copyright under 17 U.S.C. 105.
Wildfire. Short, Karen C. 2022. Spatial wildfire occurrence data for the United States, 1992-2020 [FPA_FOD_20221014]. 6th Edition. Fort Collins, CO: Forest Service Research Data Archive. https://doi.org/10.2737/RDS-2013-0009.6 Collected with United States Government funding and usable without additional permissions or fees.
Storms. NOAA National Centers for Environmental Information, Storm Events Database https://www.ncei.noaa.gov/stormevents/ A work of the United States government, no copyright under 17 U.S.C. 105. Narratives are quoted verbatim from the National Weather Service report and are not edited or summarised.




