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nafex - Re: [NAFEX] Chestnuts in 4b?

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  • From: Road's End Farm <organic87@frontiernet.net>
  • To: North American Fruit Explorers <nafex@lists.ibiblio.org>
  • Subject: Re: [NAFEX] Chestnuts in 4b?
  • Date: Mon, 24 Jan 2011 11:16:33 -0500


----- Original Message ----- From: "Adrienne Bordo" <beartown@toast.net >
To: <nafex@lists.ibiblio.org>
Sent: Sunday, January 23, 2011 6:39 PM
Subject: Re: [NAFEX] pawpaw seed and a new question



The other question I have concerns American Chestnut. To my knowledge,
they were never native in this area (just over the border from western
VT), but maybe someone could confirm that. A company in British
Columbia is selling seeds from the West Coast that would not be
carrying the blight. Any ideas on what the chances would be for
growing Chestnuts here in Zone 4b?

St. Lawrence Nurseries, in Zone 3, is offering blight resistant American Chestnut: descendents of trees found near Watertown NY in the 1970's "which, although blighted, healed over their cankers and continued to produce seed for many years. These 4th generation seedlings . . . are likely to exhibit even more resistance"

http://www.sln.potsdam.ny.us/

If there was never any blight in your area, I'd talk to Bill MacKentley (who runs St. Lawrence) as to whether these seedlings may be carrying the blight; as if they are it would seem a bad idea to introduce them -- but their existence in zone 3 (St. Lawrence grows what they sell) certainly seems to indicate that at least some of the original gene pool was hardy through zone 4 and beyond. Whether the West Coast strain is as hardy is a question, of course; again, Bill might be able to shed some light on this.



-- Rivka; Finger Lakes NY, Zone 5 mostly
Fresh-market organic produce, small scale







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