Chinese Chestnuts

Anyone out there growing Chinese Chestnuts.. ? If you do I would love to hear your orchard details.

Years ago I heard about a new disease/virus spreading east to west in the US. Calls for new resistant strains of Chestnut.

Yes. Around 1900 some say that 1/4 of all trees in parts of the East coast were American Chestnut. The Chestnut blight disease came in and killed almost all Chestnut trees in the United States. Seriously. They say that most Chestnuts can only live for a short time before they get killed by the disease down to their roots.
The song "roasting chestnuts on an open fire" had much more meaning back then when they were a common tree. It is probably one of the sadest stories of an American native tree.

They are now cross pollinating Asian Chestnuts with American to try to create a strain that resembles the American but has the disease resistance of the Chinese variety.

The only thing I know about growing them is that they love acid soil.

American chestnuts have survived in some isolated areas and are being propagated from seeds and other methods, in addition to the efforts at producing hybrids. I have seen seedlings advertised, but do not remember the source.

I do have one pure American Chestnut that I have growing.. The rest are Chinese Chestnuts seedlings and I am going to try to germinate some European seeds as well..

I do fully expect for the American Chestnut tree to acquire the blight at some point.. I am enjoying comparing the leaves to the Chinese trees..

Chinese Chestnuts grow and produce pretty well here. Certainly don't anywhere near the flavor of American Chestnuts. A very messy tree, that is a pain as a yard tree. Burrs are bad enough, but it sheds limbs second only to pecans and hickorys.

We planted two Chinese Chestnuts - very inexpensive from Burgess - in 2005. They are about 6' tall and we just harvested our first tiny handful of nuts - about what Farmerdill shows. It was very exciting!

I let them cure for a few days, then slit them and roasted at 375 degrees F. for about 8 minutes. I was surprised how easy the halves came out of the shell.

I have also recieved some European chestnuts seedling's from a friend.. So , I have several seedlings to set out..

CompostR, How many trees do you have? My Best Friend opened the first burrs from what she thought was going to be her first crop , but the nuts didn't fill out.. I'm thinking they didn't pollinate properly.. She had 3 trees that bloomed for the first time this year..

Only have the two baby trees. I think you're right about pollination - we got a few tiny nuts last year - only as big as a little fingernail - I assummed the tree had small nuts because it was immature - because I have bought small nuts at the farmers' market. I figured every year the nuts would get a little bigger - but the nuts this year are full size, so I think the problem was just as you say - no pollination.

I read all Chestnuts will cross pollinate so if I had different varieties, I wouldn't plant a nut that could be a hybrid - just to keep the American strains pure.