Chestnut Production?

[KSQ2]

We grew these trees from seed and I put the one year old whips in the ground the spring of 2016. This is the third year this one has put on burrs, but no nuts. Is that normal?
Here’s a pic, for reference, the cage is 4’.

A look at some of the burrs.
Also Matt, if you read this, two of the chestnuts you sent finally took off. They’re growing well now.

 

[RGrizzzz]

Those are male flowers aka catkins. Chestnuts usually develop male flowers before they'll develop female flowers. Female flowers are at the base of the catkins or near by, and look like spiky balls.

 

[Native Hunter]

^^^ This, and once you do start getting burs, it’s not uncommon for it to take a couple of years for the nuts to look good. I’ve seen trees as big as yours in the pic have small crops, but not all will. It may take a little longer.

 

[lakngolf]

I have some about same size, grown from seed, planted about same time. With exact same results.
I have four trees three years older that are loaded for their second year.
We have hope!

 

[KSQ2]

Thanks everybody!

 

[wbpdeer]

Thanks everybody!

I expect you will see them make a big improvement in production. Eliminate all of the ground competition around the tree you can. I started using a two prone aerator around my trees to increase water retention and improve oxygen levels around the roots. I am adding compost to those areas where I pulled the plugs out of ground with the aerator in a couple of months.

A note of advice: I use the aerator after a rain has made the soil softer and it easier to get around each tree.

 

[TreeDaddy]

I expect you will see them make a big improvement in production. Eliminate all of the ground competition around the tree you can. I started using a two prone aerator around my trees to increase water retention and improve oxygen levels around the roots. I am adding compost to those areas where I pulled the plugs out of ground with the aerator in a couple of months.

A note of advice: I use the aerator after a rain has made the soil softer and it easier to get around each tree.

Everything I know about chestnuts, I learned from Wayne,jack, and Matt in 2016

starting year 8 in containers with rootmaker method

progeny from year I ( seeds from Wayne) are prolific producers now

I realize there are other methods, ways but I get a kick out of a backyard of baby trees every year

bill

 

[yoderjac]

Everything I know about chestnuts, I learned from Wayne,jack, and Matt in 2016

starting year 8 in containers with rootmaker method

progeny from year I ( seeds from Wayne) are prolific producers now

I realize there are other methods, ways but I get a kick out of a backyard of baby trees every year

bill

I realize they are not a fit for every place, but those rootmaker grown trees were the perfect fit for my situation!

 

[TreeFan]

Dunstans in my backyard in rootmakers for 5 years are 7 to 8 feet tall and bearing chestnuts. Meanwhile dunstans the same age out in the field are 3 feet tall and spindly.. They seem to have some die off every year.. I am going to have to clear the grass away and see what happens... location - Michigan.. The rootmakers in the backyard get the special treatment while the field grown are left to themselves 200 miles away subject to the rigors of field life.. drought.. tent worms.. colder temps and such.. 3 years ago, I did a timber stand improvement and decided to try growing out in the field on a south facing ridge in higher country and some of those are doing surprisingly well.. location.. location.. location.. I have more trees in my backyard than I can plant out and I may have to break out the chainsaw soon.. hehehe

 

[yoderjac]

Dunstans in my backyard in rootmakers for 5 years are 7 to 8 feet tall and bearing chestnuts. Meanwhile dunstans the same age out in the field are 3 feet tall and spindly.. They seem to have some die off every year.. I am going to have to clear the grass away and see what happens... location - Michigan.. The rootmakers in the backyard get the special treatment while the field grown are left to themselves 200 miles away subject to the rigors of field life.. drought.. tent worms.. colder temps and such.. 3 years ago, I did a timber stand improvement and decided to try growing out in the field on a south facing ridge in higher country and some of those are doing surprisingly well.. location.. location.. location.. I have more trees in my backyard than I can plant out and I may have to break out the chainsaw soon.. hehehe

I always started mine indoors in the winter and then did the transplants to larger containers. I kept mine on the deck for 1 or 2 growing seasons in RB2 containers before planting them in the field. Without the special care and continued root pruning, things did slow down when I planted them in the field. My heavy clay is not ideal for chestnuts, but they have been doing well.

I sold all my rootmakers and tree growing stuff a couple years ago. I'm now old enough that I probably won't see benefit from trees planted going forward, but the real reason I quit is that we are done with that phase of our habitat improvement and are moving on to others.

 

[wbpdeer]

Hello yoderjac,

I am still using my rootmaker 18s. i have 11 trays out in cages right now. I will turn 70 next month and hope to keep getting seedlings grown and gift to deer hunters in this area before I pass this life. I have chestnuts, sawtooth, shumard and bur this go round. Mostly chinese chestnut and sawtooth oak.

My dustans grown like my chinese chestnut and planted like them are not near as productive. The death rate in the field is 2 to 3 times the chinese chestnut. I wanted the diversity.

wbpdeer

 

[yoderjac]

Hello yoderjac,

I am still using my rootmaker 18s. i have 11 trays out in cages right now. I will turn 70 next month and hope to keep getting seedlings grown and gift to deer hunters in this area before I pass this life. I have chestnuts, sawtooth, shumard and bur this go round. Mostly chinese chestnut and sawtooth oak.

My dustans grown like my chinese chestnut and planted like them are not near as productive. The death rate in the field is 2 to 3 times the chinese chestnut. I wanted the diversity.

wbpdeer

Good to hear from you Wayne. Your commitment to chestnuts is laudable! I'm still doing habitat work, but not chestnuts. I think your observations of Dunstans are spot on. I wouldn't say my dunstans are particularly productive. At lest not yet.

 

[TreeDaddy]

Hello yoderjac,

I am still using my rootmaker 18s. i have 11 trays out in cages right now. I will turn 70 next month and hope to keep getting seedlings grown and gift to deer hunters in this area before I pass this life. I have chestnuts, sawtooth, shumard and bur this go round. Mostly chinese chestnut and sawtooth oak.

My dustans grown like my chinese chestnut and planted like them are not near as productive. The death rate in the field is 2 to 3 times the chinese chestnut. I wanted the diversity.

wbpdeer

Attaboy, wayne

My shumards explode with radicles and topgrowth after stratification

All my seedlings do much better when deferring transplant to field until they reach 3 gal container size

bill

 

[KSQ2]

The chestnuts behind the house have a few catkins on them now, but only one tree has longer ones. The other catkins on trees are less than a quarter inch long. Are those real catkins? This the first year for these two trees to have catkins at all. It’s the third year for the tree with the longer catkins.

 

[wbpdeer]

In 2022, one of the five trees planted in my yard 8 years ago now just exploded. It went from a very weak producer of chestnuts to match my top tree. You would think someone gave it rocket fuel. The one important factor that may have caused this explosion is it had a water maple right beside the east base of the trunk. I had been fighting that old maple but declared war in the spring of 2022.

I tried salt into holes drilled in the main stems. No effect. I then drilled slanted holes into the stems and using a horse syringe from Tractor Supply I put straight roundup in the holes and immediately applied two layers of duct tape to prevent any leakage. The roundup nuked that water maple and I was able to take an axe and eliminated the stump.

My weak chestnut producer made an amazing recovery.

So, I post this to say it is a battle, competition robs our trees more than we realize.

K2Q2 here is what I have learned.

It takes two chestnut trees to create viable chestnuts on one of these trees since no chestnut self-pollenates.

A chestnut tree has male flowers and female flowers. The male flowers are called "catkins" because they look similar to a cat's tail. One year I had a badly timed thunderstorm strip my best chestnut tree in May when it was loaded with catkins. That tree had been bearing about 2 years at that point. Since that storm, I always check my trees after blowing rainstorms in the spring.

The female flowers start out about the size of your fingernail on an average man's ring finger. Sort of barrel shaped in the beginning. Some people say in YouTube videos, look for the pineapple with the sprags on the top. When the flower is getting ready / ripe for pollen you see the sprags turn a yellow. The late frost / freeze in my area killed many of the female flowers on my chestnut trees. I used the best pair of binos I have to check my trees today for female flowers. I have flowers up high in all five trees, but only 2 trees have flowers at the 6 or 7 foot height. Gonna be less chestnuts here, but I will have plenty to grow seedlings from IMO.

The female flower is what grows into the spikey burs. Chinese Chestnuts can grow up to 3 nuts in each bur. If not properly pollenated, it can grow 3 paper thin non-viable nuts. The paper-thin occurrence happens with a sentinel tree (a long ranger with no 2nd tree providing pollen). Restricted sunlight (shaded out by the taller canopy) can create non-viable burs too.

What can you do to help your Chestnut trees produce better in 2024. Fertilize timely twice is what the experts talk about. I don't have that info committed to memory so I will not post when until I have a reliable source on the timing of that. Watering enough to prevent great stress in periods of drought. A weep bucket can deliver enough water to a young tree to reduce the stress if not eliminate stress. Mulch helps reduce evaporation from sun and wind.

To get chestnuts, you need catkins on two trees in close proximity to each other with one of them having female flowers. The tree with female flowers will not produce nuts in the current year, following years of growth one hopes that tree gets going. The pollen travels from the buddy tree via the windy and with insects doing their thing. In the last 2 weeks, insects have been wearing out the catkins on my chestnut trees. Nature provides thank goodness.

My trees in year 4 were all feed compost tea for about 4 or 5 weeks and that added more to their health than anything I have done. This year I have added alpaca compost to all 5 trees. I have used it in seedling pots too. Has proven to be a great addition to my growing efforts. I have an alpaca farm about 10 miles from my house. I pay $50 for two tractor loader scoops filled my little trailer up.

The Chestnut Improvement Network is worth any dedicated chestnut growers looking up. This resource is provided by the University of Missouri in coordination with some of the best chestnut growers in the nation. Greg Miller from Route 9 Cooperative in Carrolton, Ohio is the chestnut whisper IMO. His orchard was formerly called the Empire Chestnut Company but 5 orchards formed a cooperative. They produce over 100,000 pounds of chestnuts in a normal year. As we know weather impacts our output. Go to a web browser and enter "Chestnut Improvement Network" to get connected with this free resource. They are research about 55 to 60 cultivars. Mountain Gentry Orchard in Eastern Kentucky are planting their trees and grows seedlings in Moultrie, GA.

If anyone has any questions, I will try to answer what I know and be honest about what I don't know.

 

[yoderjac]

In 2022, one of the five trees planted in my yard 8 years ago now just exploded. It went from a very weak producer of chestnuts to match my top tree. You would think someone gave it rocket fuel. The one important factor that may have caused this explosion is it had a water maple right beside the east base of the trunk. I had been fighting that old maple but declared war in the spring of 2022.

I tried salt into holes drilled in the main stems. No effect. I then drilled slanted holes into the stems and using a horse syringe from Tractor Supply I put straight roundup in the holes and immediately applied two layers of duct tape to prevent any leakage. The roundup nuked that water maple and I was able to take an axe and eliminated the stump.

My weak chestnut producer made an amazing recovery.

So, I post this to say it is a battle, competition robs our trees more than we realize.

K2Q2 here is what I have learned.

It takes two chestnut trees to create viable chestnuts on one of these trees since no chestnut self-pollenates.

A chestnut tree has male flowers and female flowers. The male flowers are called "catkins" because they look similar to a cat's tail. One year I had a badly timed thunderstorm strip my best chestnut tree in May when it was loaded with catkins. That tree had been bearing about 2 years at that point. Since that storm, I always check my trees after blowing rainstorms in the spring.

The female flowers start out about the size of your fingernail on an average man's ring finger. Sort of barrel shaped in the beginning. Some people say in YouTube videos, look for the pineapple with the sprags on the top. When the flower is getting ready / ripe for pollen you see the sprags turn a yellow. The late frost / freeze in my area killed many of the female flowers on my chestnut trees. I used the best pair of binos I have to check my trees today for female flowers. I have flowers up high in all five trees, but only 2 trees have flowers at the 6 or 7 foot height. Gonna be less chestnuts here, but I will have plenty to grow seedlings from IMO.

The female flower is what grows into the spikey burs. Chinese Chestnuts can grow up to 3 nuts in each bur. If not properly pollenated, it can grow 3 paper thin non-viable nuts. The paper-thin occurrence happens with a sentinel tree (a long ranger with no 2nd tree providing pollen). Restricted sunlight (shaded out by the taller canopy) can create non-viable burs too.

What can you do to help your Chestnut trees produce better in 2024. Fertilize timely twice is what the experts talk about. I don't have that info committed to memory so I will not post when until I have a reliable source on the timing of that. Watering enough to prevent great stress in periods of drought. A weep bucket can deliver enough water to a young tree to reduce the stress if not eliminate stress. Mulch helps reduce evaporation from sun and wind.

To get chestnuts, you need catkins on two trees in close proximity to each other with one of them having female flowers. The tree with female flowers will not produce nuts in the current year, following years of growth one hopes that tree gets going. The pollen travels from the buddy tree via the windy and with insects doing their thing. In the last 2 weeks, insects have been wearing out the catkins on my chestnut trees. Nature provides thank goodness.

My trees in year 4 were all feed compost tea for about 4 or 5 weeks and that added more to their health than anything I have done. This year I have added alpaca compost to all 5 trees. I have used it in seedling pots too. Has proven to be a great addition to my growing efforts. I have an alpaca farm about 10 miles from my house. I pay $50 for two tractor loader scoops filled my little trailer up.

The Chestnut Improvement Network is worth any dedicated chestnut growers looking up. This resource is provided by the University of Missouri in coordination with some of the best chestnut growers in the nation. Greg Miller from Route 9 Cooperative in Carrolton, Ohio is the chestnut whisper IMO. His orchard was formerly called the Empire Chestnut Company but 5 orchards formed a cooperative. They produce over 100,000 pounds of chestnuts in a normal year. As we know weather impacts our output. Go to a web browser and enter "Chestnut Improvement Network" to get connected with this free resource. They are research about 55 to 60 cultivars. Mountain Gentry Orchard in Eastern Kentucky are planting their trees and grows seedlings in Moultrie, GA.

If anyone has any questions, I will try to answer what I know and be honest about what I don't know.

My wildlife trees have to make it on their own once planted and initially protected. I do no pruning, spraying, or fertilizing. So my trees are probably slower than those that maintain a few trees well on an individual tree basis. I opted to go with a high volume of trees and no maintenance. I expect to get fewer nuts from each tree, especially in the short run, but close to the same amount of total nuts that I would get with a small enough number of trees that I could maintain them. However, in the long run, as they mature, I expect many more nuts in total.

Having said that, Wayne, you are absolutely right about competition. We planted a long row of chestnuts along a logging road about 10' from the pines on our pine farm. I expect those pines are huge competition for resources. We just did a pine thinning. As part of that, I had the loggers remove the first row of pines next to the chestnuts along that road. The thinning just occurred this spring.

I'm expecting a significant increase in production over the next few years from those trees.

 

[wbpdeer]

Four Valuable Resources for Chestnut Growers

1. The American Chestnut Foundation

2. Chestnut Improvement Network

3. Route 9 Cooperative (Carrollton, Ohio) Facebook and Website Greg Miller

4. Red Fern Farm (Tom Wahl in Wapello, Iowa) South of Muscatine close to Mississippi River Facebook and Website

Mr. Miller and Mr. Wahl are real veterans and share plenty of knowledge. Wahl has good YouTube videos on his website.

I purchase chestnuts from Route 9 Cooperative every year. I want their genetics on my farm.

wbpdeer@att.net

 

[wbpdeer]

My wildlife trees have to make it on their own once planted and initially protected. I do no pruning, spraying, or fertilizing. So my trees are probably slower than those that maintain a few trees well on an individual tree basis. I opted to go with a high volume of trees and no maintenance. I expect to get fewer nuts from each tree, especially in the short run, but close to the same amount of total nuts that I would get with a small enough number of trees that I could maintain them. However, in the long run, as they mature, I expect many more nuts in total.

Having said that, Wayne, you are absolutely right about competition. We planted a long row of chestnuts along a logging road about 10' from the pines on our pine farm. I expect those pines are huge competition for resources. We just did a pine thinning. As part of that, I had the loggers remove the first row of pines next to the chestnuts along that road. The thinning just occurred this spring.

I'm expecting a significant increase in production over the next few years from those trees.

Jack,

I say those pines suck a ton of water off those chestnut trees. I have a neighbor who loves to collect my chestnuts with one of my nuts wizards. And both of us cracked jokes about me killing the water maple. Then the #5 tree as it was called exploded. Just a head shaker. I am the dummy that wasted 2 or 3 years before I got that maple properly killed.

Pruning it worked against my goals.

 

[yoderjac]

Jack,

I say those pines suck a ton of water off those chestnut trees. I have a neighbor who loves to collect my chestnuts with one of my nuts wizards. And both of us cracked jokes about me killing the water maple. Then the #5 tree as it was called exploded. Just a head shaker. I am the dummy that wasted 2 or 3 years before I got that maple properly killed.

Pruning it worked against my goals.

Both water and they limited sun!

 

[RGrizzzz]

The chestnuts behind the house have a few catkins on them now, but only one tree has longer ones. The other catkins on trees are less than a quarter inch long. Are those real catkins? This the first year for these two trees to have catkins at all. It’s the third year for the tree with the longer catkins.

It would be odd for short catkins. Some trees bloom later than others. I'm guessing that tree is behind the first in terms of bloom time. Over time, I'd make sure all your trees are blooming together for proper fertilization.