The American Chestnut Returns

[zippy890]

Source: NPR

"WAYLAND, Mass. - July 18, 2008 - An American classic is poised for a comeback. This summer, across Massachusetts, dedicated rescuers are pollinating wild American chestnut trees.

They've been doing this for 25 years in the hopes of bringing back the chestnut, which was wiped out by a blight more than eighty years ago. This year, they think they're getting close to producing a tree that will resist the fungus."

-

THYS: There was a time, Emery says, when a squirrel could jump from Maine to Georgia on the canopy of chestnuts. The trees grew to 120 feet high and four feet across. They lived for centuries, and when they were cut down, the rot-resistant but easy-to-cut wood was used for everything from telephone poles to guitars. That was before the blight arrived more than a century ago. It is a fungus that attacks the bark. Now, the trees grow to a certain height, usually twenty feet or so, but get attacked before they can reproduce. "

-snip-







Read more: http://www.wbur.org/news/2008/78764_20080718.asp

---

Great report about optimism and people caring. Interesting in the story about how American Chestnut species grow now-, but they get a certain height/maturity and they always get the blight and die.
So hooray for the this Chinese import in this case -disease resitant genes.

audio option if you register

[libnnc]

1. great news

:bounce:

[eleny]

2. Most of us learned some of this when we were kids...

The Village Blacksmith

Under a spreading chestnut tree
The village smithy stands;
The smith, a mighty man is he,
With large and sinewy hands;
And the muscles of his brawny arms
Are strong as iron bands.


K&R

[awoke_in_2003]

8. here is another

Under the spreading chestnut tree
I sold you and you sold me
There lie they, and here lie we
Under the spreading chestnut tree

[Eurobabe]

3. I LOVE chestnut trees!!

We have tons of them across the pond, but ours are being attacked by some kind of moth. They turn the leaves brown and brittle. :(

[The Backlash Cometh]

4. four feet across or forty feet across?

[patrice]

5. That's probably the diameter of the trunk. nt

[The Backlash Cometh]

6. Ah, Makes sense.

[zippy890]

7. must have meant 40. those trees were massive

Have you ever see photos of those old chestnut trees,
incredible trees.

edit - diameter number makes sense.

[jody]

9. Wonderful news, surviving specimens of the American Chestnut in several locations.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_Chestnut

• Two of the largest surviving American Chestnut trees are in Jackson County, Tennessee. One is the state champion and has a diameter of 61 cm (24 in) and a height of 23 meters (75 ft) and the other tree is nearly as large. One of them has been pollinated with hybrid pollen by members of The American Chestnut Foundation; the progeny will have mostly American Chestnut genes and some will be blight resistant.
• On 18 May 2006, a biologist with the Georgia Department of Natural Resources spotted a stand of several trees near Warm Springs, Georgia. One of the trees is approximately 20–30 years old and 13 meters (40 ft) tall and is the southernmost American Chestnut tree known to be flowering and producing nuts {2}.
• Another large tree was found in Talladega National Forest, Alabama in June 2005.{3}. It is 26 meters (85 ft) tall with a diameter of 35 centimeters (14 in).
• In the summer of 2007, a stand of trees was discovered near the north-eastern Ohio town of Braceville.{4}{5} The stand encompasses four large flowering trees, the largest of which is approximately 23 meters (75 ft) tall, sited amongst hundreds of smaller trees that have not begun to flower, located in and around a sandstone quarry. A combination of factors may account for the survival of these relatively large American Chestnut trees including low levels of blight susceptibility, hypovirulence (the attacking blight fungus is weakened by a virus){6}, and good site conditions. In particular, some stands may have avoided exposure thanks to trees being located at a higher altitude than blighted trees in the neighboring area, the fungal spores not carrying to higher altitudes as easily.{7}
• In March 2008, officials of the Ohio Department of Natural Resources announced that a rare adult American Chestnut tree had been discovered in a marsh near Lake Erie. The officials admitted that department officials had known about the tree for seven years, but had kept its existence a secret. The exact location of the tree is still being held secret, both because of the risk of infecting the tree, but also because an eagle has nested in its branches. They described the tree as being 89 feet (27m) tall and having a circumference of 5 feet (1.5m). The American Chestnut Foundation was also only recently told about the tree's existence. {8}

[RTBerry]

10. American x Chinese hybrid chestnuts are under-utilized

We planted a couple at our previous home site (central Florida = the extreme southern range for the species). They're great trees that produce at a very young age.

See this link:

Dunstan Chestnuts

[windoe]

11. Great news.

So many trees need to be replenished.

[MNBrewer]

12. Agreed. I live in Dutch Elm Disease territory.

Elms are incredible trees, but sadly, there are fewer and fewer each year. And now the Emerald Ash Borer is on the way to Minneapolis. Sigh. international trade!

[happyslug]

19. Westmont Borough in Pennsylvania has the longest set of Elm Lined Street

http://webpages.charter.net/westmont/tree.htm
http://www.livingplaces.com/PA/Cambria_County/Westmont_Borough/Westmont_Historic_District.html
http://www.visitjohnstownpa.com/history/elms.php
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Westmont,_Pennsylvania

In the local Newspaper the trees are always in the news, when Dutch Elm Disease is detected in one (The borough has an aggressive problem of making sure the disease does NOT spread) or when the local electric Company has to do some line work, and they even THINK about cutting some of the trees limbs away from their lines.

[Lasher]

13. My brother and I each have one growing on our property.

Mine got hit by the blight last year but is sprouting back now from the stump. His is just now dying. We got them from the Department of Natural Resources as seedlings about 10 years ago, hoping we would have one that would survive. Neither tree ever got big enough to produce a chestnut.

[zippy890]

14. thats when they all get the blight- before they fully mature

weird that that nasty blight is still around everywhere, apparently in the US. and elsewhere.

This disease-resistant strain sounds very promising.

:)

[Lasher]

15. I have always dreamed of a comeback.

I hope they don't lose too much of the original species when crossbreeding with the Chinese chestnut. The Chinese species sucks. And I noticed they're saying this is a hybrid, meaning natural propagation would not occur.

[happyslug]

21. These "Hybrids" have produced seeds that grow into trees

Hybrids are sterile only if the species are so far apart that the mix is infertile, the Horse and the Donkey is the Classic example. If you breed a Horse with a Donkey you get a mule which is infertile (Fertile mules do occur, they are rare, but when they do breed, you have the same chance of getting a horse or donkey then another mule).

On the other hand if the Species have DNA close enough, the resulting progeny is fertile. Dogs with Wolves and Coyotes is the classic example of this. The resulting pups can grow and reproduce and is probably how genes are spread in all the variation of the Canis species.

The latter appears to be the case with Chestnuts, the resulting seeds are fertile. What the breeders are trying to do is transfer the Blight Resistance of the Chinese Chestnut to the American Chestnut through a careful breeding process. This is worked with other species in the past, through mostly annuals, for you only have to wait one year to plant the next generation to see if you have made the transfer AND breed out all the other traits of species you do not want (i.e. Cross breed the American and Chinese Chestnuts and then breed OUT the Chines characteristics except for the Resistance to the Blight). Hopefully this will work out, but they have been at it for Decades but every few years they slower get better and better results.

[Lasher]

25. OK thanks.

I'm starting to wonder if the seedlings we got all those years ago from our Department of Natural Resources might have been a couple of those crossbreeds. Maybe I'll see if we can still get them. Then in another decade or so I'll find out if I've got a survivor.

Anyway thanks for the lesson on hybrids.

[depakid]

16. There were AMAZING trees:

The American Chestnut Tree
Samuel B. Detwiler
Reprinted from American Forestry, October, 1915.

Our native chestnut tree is one of our best known and best loved trees because of its beauty and utility. It grows from southeastern Maine west to southern Michigan and south to northern Virginia, southern Indiana and along the Appalachian Mountains to northern Georgia, Alabama and Mississippi. The bright foliage, attractively-shaped leaves, toothsome nuts and stately form give distinction and character to this highly valuable commercial tree of our forests.

The finest chestnut trees in the world are found in the southern Appalachian Mountains, especially in western North Carolina and eastern Tennessee. A tree with a diameter of 17 feet has been recorded from Francis Cove, North Carolina. Commonly, the mature trees are 3 to 5 feet in diameter and 60 to 90 feet in height, but there are numerous specimens 7 feet or more in diameter, 100 to 120 feet high. In Pennsylvania, New York and the New England States chestnut trees have mostly grown from stump sprouts, and are therefore comparatively small.

When growing in the forest, a chestnut tree will bear only a moderate amount of shade, and the crowding of adjoining trees causes the early death of the lower branches. For this reason forest-grown chestnut trees nearly always have long, straight, clear trunks, branching out into rather small, rounded tops. In the open the trunk is short, dividing into three or four heavy horizontal branches to form a broad, beautifully rounded head.

http://www.chattoogariver.org/index.php?req=chestnut&quart=W2002

[roguevalley]

17. we had those in Oregon . We would take the prickly seed pods and

throw them at each other. the seed inside is so beautiful.

[happyslug]

20. They are one or two of them in Oregon

They were planted in Oregon by people who missed the American Chestnut, so they imported a seed and planted it in their yards. These still survive for the Blight NEVER crossed the Great Plains (And Oregon was NOT an area with American Chestnut, so the Tree was so rare any blight could NOT survive).

Remember it was New York City that caused the Chestnut Blight. It was in New York that someone came up with the bright idea of importing Chinese Chestnuts for a small park. It is from these trees that the Blight came into the US and killed off the American Chestnut. Attempts were made to plant additional Chinese Chestnuts to replace the American Chestnuts, but those were unsuccessful for the Chinese Chestnut is a much smaller tree, and thus can NOT survive in a Mature American Forest. European Chestnuts were also tried, but they were susceptible to the Blight AND not Much bigger then the Chinese Chestnut. Thus the plan has been to breed the Chinese with the American, then breed out all of the Chinese Chestnut Characteristics except for the Resistance to the Blight. This has been going on since the 1930s, but do to the life span of Chestnuts, it has taken them this long to get what the American Chestnut Society believes is a tree that is all American AND has the Resistance to the Blight of the Chinese. One of these decades they will succeed, each year you hear of improvements in this system, but it takes time to back breed AND find out if the Tree has blight Resistance.

I remember my father talking about Chestnuts, the blight had already hit the US and was spreading South but he ran across them in Maryland in the 1930s. Chestnuts were the easiest tree to split. My father always like commenting on Abraham Lincoln fame as a log-splitter, splitting 300-600 trees a day (the Number grew as Lincoln ran for President AND again after Lincoln died). My father's comment was the numbers of trees Lincoln split was perfectly possible IF THE TREES WERE ALL CHESTNUTS (Generally when we were camping and building a fire and trying to split some knot ridden piece of wood we wanted to burn). This ability to split lead to all the split end fences that were once common in Pennsylvania (And the rest of the East coast). The reason was you could split the chestnut easily into rails. You could NOT use chestnut as a post, it rotted to quickly if left in the ground, but up in the air and perfectly good rail (Locust was the preferred tree for posts, and I still have a problem calling Locust Trees Locust Trees, for when I was growing up my father always called them Locust posts, even before we cut them and it what I learn to call them and I still call them by the name "Locust Post" not Locust Trees.

Now Chestnuts were used as posts, but Locust was preferred. When a Vertical load was expected, pine was preferred (such as Ships Masts, and timber frame buildings, like most homes) but Chestnut could be used. Chestnut was also a steady producer of Nuts, Oaks could produce larger number of nuts, but the amount of Oak Acorns varied from year to year, Chestnuts were consistent from year to year as to the number of nuts they produced (thus the lost of the Chestnut hurt a lot of American wildlife that was dependent on the Chestnut for seeds to eat). The lost of the chestnut did a huge amount of damage to the Timber industry, Farmers who used it on their farms and the birds and animals of the forest. Hopefully the Chestnut can make it back,

Foo more on the American Chestnut go to the American Chestnut Foundation:
http://www.acf.org/

[roguevalley]

23. the park in the center of Central Point, my home town has dozens of them

and they are older than the hills. I love them. They are lovely shade trees.

[happyslug]

33. Chestnuts are considered quick growing trees.

You do have trees that grow quicker, the Aspens come to mind, but Aspens only grow so far and then stop. As a Forest Matures Aspens are pushed out (as are Locust another quick growing tree). Oaks, Maples and Cherries are the tall trees of the North American Forest. The American Chestnut was in this group.

When a forest dies out (Clean cut or forest fire) the first things that grow back are berries, blackberries, Raspberries, Huckleberries etc. These are replaced by "Second Growth" Trees like the Locust and Aspen. Finally as the forest returns to a mature status, the Oaks, Maples, Cherries and pre-blight days, Chestnuts. Most of these trees would exist in Second growth forests, but small compared to the Locust trees. AS these four Trees grow taller then the Locust, the Locust tends to die out, opening up spaces for Oaks, Cherries, Maples and Chestnuts. The first of these to grow to full height was the Chestnut. It tended to die out about the time the Oaks and Cherries came to their full heights.

Thus the old saying, you plant Chestnuts for your own retirement, oaks for your Children's old age, and black Walnuts for your Grand-children's old age (Black Walnut take even longer then Oaks and Cherries to grow to full height). In my home state of Pennsylvania most of the Trees were cut down by WWI, but now 80 years later the Cherries are of the age to be cut down and are a major tree harvested in Pennsylvania. In fact Allegheny National Forest is reported to be the ONLY National Forest making money for the Forest Service, do to all the Cherries being harvested (Cherries bring in a lot of money when sold as timber for furniture). Chestnuts grow even faster, Chestnuts were known for 40 year turnaround (i.e. cut one down, 40 years later you had a tree you could cut down and sell for a good price). The lost of the Chestnut hurt a lot of rural communities in the years between WWI and WWII when the blight spread throughout the Eastern Half do the US. It is missed and maybe one day it will be back.

[suffragette]

22. We did that in Seattle, too, when we were kids.

But I remember adults called them horse chestnut trees and that the nuts were inedible.

[Heidi]

27. Horse chestnut (conker) trees are another thing. They're in the buckeye family

of trees, and aren't really chestnut trees. :hi:

These are fresh horse chestnut conkers; eating the nuts can make you sick.


Below is a real (edible) chestnut in its prickly outer layers. We have chestnut trees all over the place in our part of Switzerland; a walk in the woods can yield bags full of them. You roll the prickly outer layer off with your shoe and keep the nut. We use a special knife to make an X in the top of each nut, and then roast several handfuls in a special pan in the fireplace in the fall. The incision in the shell makes it easy to peel the shell away to eat the nut. YUM!

[suffragette]

36. Ah, the memories those pics and your description gives me

The top pic of those horse chestnuts. They would cover the ground and we'd slip on them and we'd throw them at each other. Always thought the nut inside was pretty, but yes, we knew not to eat them. We have many of those trees in Seattle. They are great shade trees.

When I lived in Karlsruhe, I had my my 1st roast chestnuts on a snowy day at the Christkindlmarkt. Warm the hands and the tummy!

[Trajan]

18. Chestnut Trees ?

Under the spreading chestnut tree
I sold you and you sold me
There lie they, and here lie we
Under the spreading chestnut tree ...


George Orwell .... 1984

[galledgoblin]

24. thank you for posting this

it's nice to read something where we're improving the environment for once. :)

[paparush]

26. That's awesome! Good news as our Hemlocks are going fast.

[Withywindle]

28. That takes me back.

American Chestnut saplings were all over the woods where I grew up (Southwestern VA) but we knew they'd all die eventually - it made me really sad. There's a family picture when I was little taken under one that grew to a pretty good size.

I hope they succeed, no matter how long it takes.

[zippy890]

29. Ok HEAD UP this is important INVOLVING THE ROOTS OF THE NETWORK

jesus I it caint b that fast

bear with me
having a little fun



thats all arent' we, jus having fun. clearly stated forthwith!!

dishes in Washington State


by by

follow a few links and we'll see

How far the rabbit hole will go

Plus its imprtant about the trees and teh greatest page and other posts I mafe and given money.

thx

[zippy890]

32. our state taxes oing to some good use anyway AND

thanks to the study of genetics

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?
az=show_mesg&forum=105&topic_id=7938763&mesg_id=7938763

[MBS]

30. nice story--thanks! n/t

[Blue_Tires]

31. just what we need...a tenfold increase in the squirrel population

:silly:

[panzerfaust]

34. Good News

[susanna]

35. What hopeful news! I've passed it on to gardening friends. Thanks for posting it! n/t

[llmart]

37. There's a relatively new book out......

about the American Chestnut. Can't remember the title or author right now, but I'm sure doing a search on Amazon would get you the info if you wanted it. I'm too lazy right now:)

I haven't read the book but it's on my list. My library owns it also. This is an uplifting news story for a change.