They're my seeds, but designated for roasting. I'm snatching 2 of my own seeds. You need to lighten up and crawl out of your encyclopedia.

My post was humorous, but you can not answer if it bothers you.

From what I've learned, you plant chestnuts directly into the ground about now. The taproot will start growing over the winter. You'll need two trees to get cross-pollination.

What kind of chestnuts did you buy?

I planted some pure American chestnuts this year. I am far from where the chestnut blight lives, so I should be ok. I'm hoping that I can find some blight resistant American chestnuts for planting in the future.

Very unlikely to grow, they'll probably be too dry. But no harm in giving it a try. Soak overnight before planting, and then sow right away in a deep pot indoors. If viable, the root will start growing within a few days, and the shoot follow on in a week or two. Extra light through the dark part of winter will help.

One I grew like this (from a freshly collected nut under a tree, though) reached a metre tall in its first year with two extra flushes of growth through the spring and summer. The taproot will be similar or even larger, so you'll need a big pot!

Resin

"You need to lighten up and crawl out of your encyclopedia...My post was humorous"

Almost as humorous as my encyclopedia, but not quite. LOL

It's not farfetched at all. I have a friend who about 40 years ago bought a bag of chestnuts at a grocery store and saw that a radicle was emerging from one so he planted it on the parking strip in front of his house. He was quite certain it was Castanea sativa, not C. mollissima, because the package was labeled as European in origin. The tree grew well for about 20 years but then died back to the ground. He thought a lawn service had damaged the trunk, but he couldn't rule out blight. The next season it resprouted four trunks and has grown to its present size about 20 ft. tall, and it's tied for being the largest of its species in Colorado. No chestnuts are native here, of course, and they've rarely been planted. The specific one I'm referring to above produces burs but has never produced filled nuts though at least one other isolated chestnut tree I know has done so; normally they're self-infertile.

"The tree grew well for about 20 years but then died back to the ground. .... its present size about 20 ft. tall, and it's tied for being the largest of its species in Colorado"

Quite possibly cold damage - was it a hard winter that it died back in? It is usually only considered zone 7 hardy, marginal in zone 6.

Resin

i though the same as brandon .... lol

anyway .... i suppose it depends on how 'fresh' the nuts are ....

e.g. apples and potatoes can be upwards of a year old.. until the 'new crop' comes in ... i suppose there are ways to hold all stock for extended periods of time...

but all that said... what do you have to lose .... give it a go .... i would tend to moisten them up like resin suggests.. and then pot them.. and throw the pot outdoors out of the sun.. and let ma nature do her magic .... i would hesitate to make this an indoor project ... but that is me .... or steal two.. one outside.. one inside ....

one other thing .... do you know what the latin name is .... are you sure it is zone appropriate???? .. i doubt the sales packing for edible nuts has the type/species .... so i dont know how we can ID it.. to find out what you are trying to grow.... i suppose some of the tree nuts here [get it???] might be able to ID the nut itself .. hate for you to go thru all this, only to find out the tree cant cope with your zone

anyway.. good luck

ken

I remember reading somewhere that imported chestnuts from Europe or Asia are heat treated to kill various weevils for APHIS import reasons, and this will also render them incapable of growing. Now, whether this is true or just internet unreliable information, I can't say.

I will tell you that, out of two pounds of chestnuts I bought at the local market for planting a few years back, I had a Zero percent success rate. Neither the Korean nor Italian ones germinated.

Of course, the squirrels did enjoy the chestnut snack in the middle of winter once they found the seedbed! :( They could have left me ONE, but didn't.

So, yes, if you try it, I suggest the baggie of peat in the fridge method!

I bought a batch of 'Dunstan' chestnuts last year on ebay, I saved some for planting and grew 20 seedlings (some in ground and some in containers). Every one I planted sprouted. I've already given some of them away as gifts.

The ones at the grocery store are most likely C.sativa since they're mostly imported from Italy. I'd look for some with Chinese parentage if I were you.

This is back around June, they ended up growing to about 15 inches tall this year.
{{gwi:496165}}

Dunstan is a Castanea dentata x C. mollissima cross. They're pretty proud of that particular hybrid. Apparently it's a good nut producer, but it is a patented breed.

They are Italian Chestnusts Garden sweet Brand. by Procacci Brothers Sales Corp. Philadelphia, PA.

That is what I thought about them that maybe they were treated specially and won't grow. The worst part about it is they baked up rock hard, 4 dollars down the drain, but due to bad chestnuts, not bad cooking instructions. I was going back next week to buy some, but I think I'll take my 4 dollars to ebay then.

Our weather wants to be winter half the time, then in the 40s and 50s the other, but February is our worst month and it may freeze over and die being so young if I put it out.

If I start it out in a pot outdoors, a 5 gallon bucket in potting soil, it might do well even in a zone 7 weather, maybe?

Thanks for all the great advice. I appreciate it!

Hi Resin, I thought C. sativa was a little hardier since Dirr has it listed as Zones 5 to 7. However, if it's marginally hardy here, your point could be very well taken because we had some exceptionally cold weather in 1982, 1983 and 1991. My friend who planted the tree is in his late 90s now so his memory about the date of the dieback isn't the best.

I've never heard of chestnut blight occurring here; as I said, all the species are rare here. It would be interesting to hear some stories about the occurrence of chestnut blight far from the native range of either C. dentata or C. sativa. The only thing I've read was some speculation by A. L. Jacobsen about blight in Seattle, and a post by maackia (I think it was) on this forum about possible blight in an old cultivated grove in Wisconsin near the Mississippi.

"The worst part about it is they baked up rock hard, 4 dollars down the drain, but due to bad chestnuts"

That suggests they were already far too dry to have had any chance of growing.

"I thought C. sativa was a little hardier since Dirr has it listed as Zones 5 to 7"

I've read of trees being cut back in severe winters even in zone 7.

"It would be interesting to hear some stories about the occurrence of chestnut blight far from the native range of either C. dentata or C. sativa"

Chestnut blight has proven abilities of long-distance dispersal; spores stuck to the feet of migrating birds were implicated in its rapid spread when it first arrived in N America. But true it is unlikely to reach very isolated chestnuts. Sweet Chestnut is susceptible, but much less so than American Chestnut; in southern Europe, scattered trees die, but the species is still common overall. Also notable is that the blight hasn't reached northern Europe despite being within easy colonisation range of southern European infections, suggesting the disease can't cope with the N European climate.

Resin

I thought that European chestnuts (C. sativa) had a hypovirulent blight that helps them build immune defenses against more severe forms of blight. Also, I thought I heard that because they have a form of blight, they have some genetic defenses.

Blight can be harbored on oak trees, too.

The native range of C. dentata extended from Georgia to Maine and into Canada. The American Chestnut Foundation is working to incorporate native C. dentata trees in the northern states into the blight resistant strains they have been breeding. The thinking being that the northern trees have evolved to adapt to the cold weather. There are programs in Vermont, New Hampshire, Massachusetts, and Connecticut to find and cross-pollinate any existing local trees with the hybrids.

I have grown chestnuts from the store here in eastern Canada, but the Italian ones die after only a few years. The cold takes them. The sativa ones might make 3 or 4 years, but sudden cold after a warm spell gets them too. C dentata is the best for here, iron clad hardy, almost bombproof. Mollissima hybrids may die back at the tips in a cold year, but do well most of the time. There is a big difference in seedlots as far as survival and growth rate. American chestnuts (dentatas) are smaller, but very sweet, good tasting.

Jocelyn

Hi Resin,

Does the chestnut blight stop at obvious natural barriers such as the Pyrenees, or does it tail off more gradually as one moves northward, parallel to a temperature isoline?

It has been present in both SW Germany and northern Switzerland for nearly 20 years (European Journal of Forest Pathology 21: 250-252, 1991; 24: 241-244, 1994), so the Pyrenees and Alps haven't stopped it. Not sure how far north it goes in France, though the info is likely available somewhere. And no doubt with global warming it'll reach Britain eventually.

Resin

Absent from northern France: "With the exception of the UK and northern France, almost all the European chestnut growing areas have been infected by the blight caused by C. parasitica": For. Snow Landsc. Res. 76, 3: 361Â367 (2001).

Resin

Here is a link that might be useful: (pdf file)

Resin, thanks for that article, a good overview of the blight and hypovirulence situation in Europe. The dates on blight appearance were interesting, e.g., Portugal being so much later than Spain. Faulty reporting perhaps. I don't know if climate is keeping it out of the UK, though, if it finds Switzerland, Germany and Hungary hospitable. --S.

Hi Cacau - I'd suspect the Portugal case is lack of monitoring. Switzerland, Germany and Hungary all have much more continental climates than here; they get colder in winter, but are also much warmer in summer.

Sweet Chestnut is unique in Castanea in being able to grow well even with cool summers, with good specimens up to 28m tall even in the far north of Scotland; all the other species show poor growth even in the warmest parts of southeastern England. I'd guess the fungus, having evolved with Asian species, has never been in a position to adapt to cool summer climates.

Resin

Resin, do you know of an online resource that has maps of native ranges of European tree species, specifically C. sativa?

If the cool summer climate somehow keeps the blight from completing its life cycle, that could say something about the presence of many healthy-looking chestnut trees in Seattle, whatever their species (Jacobsen considers them mostly American/European hybrids, not mixed with Asian genes).

What is the status of C. dentata in the UK? Too chilly in the summer for it to grow well?

Yes of course a chestnut, from the market, will grow! Cold Stratification is your best bet luv. You're tricking it into thinking it's winter. For all of you idiots saying...oh! That's theft! Shut up! I work in the market. After Christmas, I took a big lot home! During the cold stratification, the odd one will develop mold. Toss those in the trash! After 2 to 3 months, I had lovely roots on four of the chestnuts! Placed them in a pot, covered them slightly with a good soil. I also put a small plastic tray on top just until they were settled. They've shot up so quickly in the sunny window! Good luck hun. Take 8 chestnuts. You never know!

There is a sativa tree, sweet chestnut, in Wolfville, Nova Scotia, about 5 hours south of me. It does well there. Seedlot matters when you are bringing seeds north. Having said that, SOME seedlings in most seedlots will be hardy where you live, just LESS of them as you move a particular seedlot north. Some will not have enough dormancy and will wake up and lose hardiness in a warm spell, and then be taken by the cold that follows. Steady cold is better, if moving seeds north. Treating chestnuts for weavils is usually done at 120 degrees F, which allows seed to germinate. Try them, by all means :)

Maybe this will help encourage you.....

My experience with sweet chestnut up north in scandinavia is that they don't often wake up in a warm spell, but they do wait a bit too long to go dormant in the fall. They never get any frost damage but they still have leaves in november when the first heavy snow might come some years. Sooner or later there will be broken branches. But I guess it all depends on what characteristics your chestnut tree have, and how your climate is.

@Nordica you DO realize you just necroposted on a 9 year old thread. The fact that you did that in order to promote theft certainly doesn't make it any more palatable.

Does anybody know the current situation at The American Chestnut Foundation? I noticed they have totally changed their donor scheme. Seems WAY more expensive now as well as oddly tiered. $300 for 4 seeds or $1000 for 12 - really?

At least they seem to have stopped promising people that they're going to have blight resistant trees any day now. Though the total lack of any timetable at all is even more off-putting.

I had a friend (much older) way back in the 90s who was growing increasingly miffed with TACF because he had been waiting for years and they kept promising blight resistant trees were right around the corner. He actually grew rather angry as he neared the end of his life. I mean, *I* knew that there weren't likely to be any blight resistant trees for the public at large for probably at least another 50 years (I'd still guess several decades at least, if ever, but can't tell from what little they actually say on their website any more). But the way they were acting like it would be ANY DAY now, I could understand how someone not horticulturally educated could get het up as the years roll by and there's still nothing viable on the horizon, though they (used to) keep telling you it is.

I'm as sure as I can be that they used to offer seedlings, at least. No way am I giving them $300 for 4 seeds that might or might not even germinate. I once was considering getting some seedlings (as I recall you had to buy a "membership" and then get on a waiting list for something that was 99% NOT going to end up with much, if any, resistance) but fell ill and have since moved off my rural property.

I MIGHT give them $75 for a seedling with SOME chance at resistance, even fully well expecting it to grow for about 5 years or so and then succumb to the blight anyway (which is what you should expect). Trees have LONG generations and I fully well understand that the particular method of back crossing they are using means they need to make a lot of crosses and plant a lot of trees as widely dispersed (geographically) as possible to find just one success.

But seeds? Not interested in "seeds" at all. I'm still not quite as old as my now-long-departed older friend who went to his grave still without an American Chestnut on his property, but I'm getting close. Close enough I don't want to mess with trying to grow a tree from seed, especially a tree that I should expect to fall to the blight within the span of the lifetime of a middlin' successful TV show. LOL!

EDIT: FOUND it! They used to offer 5 seedlings @ $35 plus a $25 "membership fee" if you weren't already a member. That's $12 apiece.

Now they want $75 apiece (or more) for just the seeds and apparently you can't get seedlings at all. I'm definitely out on this "deal". Somebody new must be in charge over there.