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nafex - Re: [NAFEX] Resistant butternut - Hybrids

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  • From: "Dr. Lucky Pittman" <lucky.pittman@murraystate.edu>
  • To: "'North American Fruit Explorers'" <nafex@lists.ibiblio.org>
  • Subject: Re: [NAFEX] Resistant butternut - Hybrids
  • Date: Tue, 25 Jan 2011 09:30:37 -0600

I dug back through my files and found Dr. Spurgeon's article in the Sept
2004 issue of the NNGA Nutshell - "Butternuts - the Bad and the Good News",
observations from his 25+ years of experience with
butternut/buartnut/heartnut clones on black walnut rootstock.

Dr. Spurgeon's observations:
"1. All true butternuts are at risk from the Sirococcus fungus and those
that appear healthy are either hybrids with Japanese walnut(or the heartnut
bud sport), or are in isolated stands that have not been exposed to the
fungus.
2. Butterjap and buarts are variably tolerant of the Sirococcus fungus;
resistance ranges from partial to complete.
3. Pure Japanese walnut and the bud sport heartnut are completely tolerant
of the Siroccoccus fungus, presumably because both have evolved together."

The 'butternut' clones 'Ayres', 'Bountiful', 'Cobles #1', 'Kenworthy' have
been shown by genetic testing to be buartnuts, and have exhibited complete
resistance/tolerance in Dr. Spurgeon's orchard.
'Pierce' and 'Wallick' buartnuts were unaffected, healthy, and productive
'Mitchell' and 'Hancock' butternut hybrids appear to be mildly affected, as
was 'Kinneyglen'.
All heartnut clones appear to be fully resistant.
Presumed pure butternut clones - Bear Creek, Beckwith, Booth, Buckley,
Chamberlin, Creighton, My Joy, Van Syckle - were all severely affected, and
are probably no longer in existence in his orchard, as in 2004 Dr. Spurgeon
opined that they probably would all be dead within a few years.

So... Dr. Spurgeon's message was that the Bad News is that pure butternut is
probably a dying species that will be extinct in the near future, but the
Good News is that canker-resistant hybrids of butternut with Japanese walnut
and heartnut are already here - and some have been propagated for 75 years
or more as 'butternuts', with no one knowing that they were actually hybrids
until the advent of genetic testing through DNA analysis.

LLP






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