One Thousand Chestnut Trees - a Whitetail Deer Project

***Announcement***

If you want "Chinese Chestnuts" for 2017, contact Rogers38 on this forum. His thread is "Small Chinese Chestnuts." He is located in Richmond, KY which is in Zone 7A or 7B. He is east of me and north some.

He has two great producing chestnut trees. He gave me permission to give this out.

This service he is providing will prevent anyone from losing this year for growing Chinese Chestnuts. His trees are being to drop - better get in line fast.

Wayne
 
Well I am excited tonight. In the fall of 2014 I began collecting Chinese Chestnuts for distribution. I collected under two trees primarily that are referred to as Ms. Pauline's Trees.

So I collect in fall of 2014. In Jan of 2015 I started my first Chinese Chestnuts in rootmaker 18s. In April of 2015, I planted 5 of my seedlings in my back yard. The avatar to the left of this post if my best tree. In 2016 I brewed compost tea and feed these trees many times along with some new shrubs planted in the front of my house.

Fast-forward to September 2017, I just collected 21 nice chestnuts off of 2 of these trees. The tree in the avatar had 19 and another tree had 2. These chestnuts are beauties.

Looking at the trees, I have a good chance of collecting another 20 from the trees. Some burs are still green.

I will try to get a photo tomorrow. Right now these 21 chestnuts are soaking.

Wayne
 
That is amazing, Wayne. To get production in that short of time. Do you guarantee those same results for all the nuts you shipped??? jk
 
Lakngulf,

You mean yours have not done the same thing? Ha Ha

These trees have not been stressed except the 3 on the south side of my yard, they have had standing water when we received an 11 inch rain storm in 2015.

I have watered them religiously in extremely hot weather. I have not sprayed for insect damage like I should have.

Just been very fortunate with the early production but proud nonetheless.

Wayne
 
My chestnuts from my trees in my back yard were soaked over night and dried with a fan on a towel in the floor.

They will go in the fridge in a sandwich bag with holes poked in one side. They look great. Here you go ...

My Chestnuts WBP.JPG

These chestnuts remind me of when I was scratching my head and a rookie learning up from down. These chestnuts are my top priority for Jan 2018. I will collect some chestnuts from my wife's grandfather's trees that will be my second priority. I have 11 seedlings from Pa Dye's trees in my greenhouse now. I will plant them next spring on our farm.

Thanks for reading this thread. If you want Chinese Chestnuts this year, Rogers38 is the person to contact on this forum. I am taking the year off from distributing in 2017.

Wayne
 
Wayne,

I think it's really cool that your pampered trees are producing in such a short time, but is it really wise to start growing trees from those first viable nuts? Have these trees had enough opportunity to express their suitability for propagation? For example: Wouldn't it be better, from a hunting perspective, to select nuts from trees that drop later in the year? Also, since these trees had the very best of care, isn't it difficult to determine how hardy they are? Not trying to be a wet blanket, but this seems to be the opposite of the kind of selective harvest being done by the ACF, in their on-going efforts to produce a blight-resistant strain of American chestnut.

Jason
 
Jason,

The ACF has money and scientific expertise that I don't have. I am one person and they are the leaders of the pack. They do great things and my contributions have exceeded what I hoped for. Personally, I wanted to give back to the whitetail deer. The participation level has been super and for that I appreciate guys like you and others.

I know exactly which tree provided the chestnuts from which these five were grown. Why did I plant five in my yard? I planted them so I would be able to collect chestnuts conveniently and timely. I added 8 to the number, hopefully today I get in the 30s in my yard. Believe I will get over 40 chestnuts in my yard this year - two rootmaker 18s worth.

This is a numbers business - I have shipped 18,600 chestnuts to you and other habitat growers. The more seedlings that get planted by habitat growers the more chestnuts that the whitetail deer should have available. These specific chestnuts really matter to me - I ain't sharing these without anyone at this point.

I had a late dropping tree that was eliminated because a family installed a nice back yard pool with 8 foot wooden fence. That was not good news to me but ownership has all the cards.

I think all kind of issues worked to my advantage to get chestnuts in two years - good luck is better than no luck at all.

One of these trees was loaded with catkins in 2016 until a harsh thunderstorm stripped all of them.

These five trees have allowed me to examine trees as they develop & grow in each season.

I am not over thinking this - got chestnuts in two years. Means I am lucky and I wish others were as lucky.

Rogers38 is doing a good job in 2017 collecting and shipping. Now that is great news!!!

Wayne
 
TreeDaddy,

I appreciate your kind words. Typing on the keyboard don't require much time - collecting, prepping, counting, shipping and tracking the orders - that is a killer time wise.

I will concentrate on growing seedlings on this post this year and try to answer questions for folks that grow in containers. Direct seedling is not something I have been successful at so others will have to provide their successful practices.

For my personal use I will collect about 500 chestnuts and right now I am at 275 approximately from two locations with two locations to go. I want to make sure certain trees I know of continue to have their goodness spread around. I will not put all of those into rootmaker 18s because we never see 100% germination. As said many times, it is a numbers game.

In Portland, TN it has been a great year for growing grass with so many timely rains. I believe our deer should have good antlers due to that rainfall this calendar year. Doesn't hurt the chestnut trees either.

Have a good day.

Wayne
 
Wayne.....I need your expertise .....again. I just got my first chestnut nuts off my own trees...ever! The burs opened and each had what appears to be a healthy nut and then 2 much smaller under-formed nuts. Will these smaller under-formed nuts be able to germinate???
first chestnuts.jpg
 
J Bird,

No the undersized (almost flat or flat) will not germinate. The tree will make sure one or two of chestnuts make it and it with holds the nutrients from the other chestnuts.

Congrats on getting viable chestnuts - felt good I expect. Chinese Chestnut can have 1, 2, or 3 chestnuts in the bur. It will sacrifice two to get one good one. Natures way of making sure something continues.

I hope my answer helps.

Wayne
 
Testing a Chestnut for Viability

I believe the "squeeze test" is a great way to determine if a chestnut is viable. Take a single chestnut and squeeze it between your thumb and index finger. Is it firm? Is it completely soft and squishy? This test is useful when you have collected 100s under a tree or you are inspecting your bag that has been in the fridge for weeks.

If I see white on my chestnuts - those get tossed. If a chestnut is soft - it is rotten on the inside and it gets tossed too.

To me it frustrating to spend all of the time attempting to grow seedlings in a grow box and seeing white show up on the nuts or never germinates. I just believe it is better to test for viability before we get to the growing media / grow box phase.

Wayne
 
All great info and help Wayne - thank you. I didn't figure the others would be good but I wasn't going to toss them out until I knew for sure. I'm pretty tickled about them!
 
j-bird said:
All great info and help Wayne - thank you. I didn't figure the others would be good but I wasn't going to toss them out until I knew for sure. I'm pretty tickled about them!
Click to expand...
J Bird - rightfully so.

Congrats on your success and I hope you get a bunch of seedlings started from these.

Wayne
 
I have 2 more nuts to open and hope for as many viable seeds and plan to try to grow a total of 4.
 
My seedlings I saved for fall Planting are looking healthy with the exception is these 2. They have a white substance on them. Any thoughts ?
5c920226b48c8c021f0eaefef9a43a2f.jpg


Sent from my SM-G930V using Tapatalk
 
I am not 100% sure but I think it is moldy mildew (correct term "Powdery Mildew). If you take those grow bags to a nursery, I bet they say the same thing.

They can tell you what to spray them with. The cost of the spray may exceed the value of the two seedlings. Any hardware store will sell you something to take care of the moldy mildew (Powdery Mildew). I had it once and spray seedlings twice and things got better fast.

Others may have a different take.

Wayne
 
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