Chestnut trees

C

coolbrze0

Active Member
Wasn't sure if this is the right forum to post this in but I've heard deer, bear, & turkey love Chestnuts so I was thinking about planting some. I guess drawbacks would be Amer Chestnuts can get the blight & that Cnuts ripen early so prob. only help during our early archery season.

Any online stores y'all have purchased from that are recommended? Also, I've heard Dunstan Cnuts are good but what kind of Chestnuts do you recommend? I've got 85 fruit trees in the orchard including about a dozen persimmons, was just thinking of some other variety of tree...
 
All I will say is that I personally have struggled with Dunstan Chestnuts (from Chestnut hill). I am going to try Chinese Chestnuts and see what happens. I hear Chinese tolerate a wider variety of soils and conditions vs the dunstans. I personally have not been impressed with Dunstans...thus far.
 
Deer love chestnuts, and I love eating them too. I would recommend Chinese rather than Dunstan. They are cheaper, easier to grow and produce well. You might consider planting a few Dunstans just for the sake of learning and experience.

Seedling Chinese in my area drop from September 15 to October 20. Every single one will be gobbled up. As Cutman said, deer love Sawtooths too, and they are easy to grow as well. I want both in my planting. I have about 30 chestnut trees producing now and a few more young ones.
 
For all intents and purposes Dunstans are Chinese. They may have a little bit of American in them but not much.

I would take the advice of everyone else and do research on Chinese varieties. There are a lot of really good ones that are much better than the Dunstan. Dunstans are over hyped and marketed to death with easy access at places like Wal-Mart and Home Depot.

Matt


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
 
mattpatt said:
For all intents and purposes Dunstans are Chinese. They may have a little bit of American in them but not much.

I would take the advice of everyone else and do research on Chinese varieties. There are a lot of really good ones that are much better than the Dunstan. Dunstans are over hyped and marketed to death with easy access at places like Wal-Mart and Home Depot.

Matt


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
Click to expand...

Matt,

Curious how you’d classify the AU hybrids compared to regular Chinese.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
 
They’re hybrids. I just think the Dunstan has been so over hyped it’s ridiculous.

I have a AU Homestead in the home orchard that’s doing fairly well. Don’t know that I’d recommend it thought as it hasn’t produced much but that just may be because it’s a young tree.

I also have a cross that was produced by taking pollen from it and fertilizing one of my Chinese late dropping trees. That tree is growing in my orchard now as well and is about 4-5 years old. Bad thing is it blooms very late and only has produced one unpollinated burr last year and doesn’t look like it produced any this this year. It also just got though from going through its second bloom in August which I’ve seen before with a few other chestnut trees that fail to set nuts the spring. It’s like they know they should and try again and of course there’s nothing around to pollinate.

Matt


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
 
Last edited:
Not to high-jack the thread, but where can a person locate a chart or the like on what varieties drop when? I think most of us would like to have a group of trees if possible start dropping around 9/15 to 10/1 or so and then carry into as late into the year as possible....like most folks try to do with fruit trees. Are there different varieties that give us such options? Lastly - I have seen talk about AU (Auburn University) chestnuts, but I am not sure where I can get them...as I have only seen "dunstan" and "chinese" chestnuts for sale so far....
 
j-bird said:
Not to high-jack the thread, but where can a person locate a chart or the like on what varieties drop when? I think most of us would like to have a group of trees if possible start dropping around 9/15 to 10/1 or so and then carry into as late into the year as possible....like most folks try to do with fruit trees. Are there different varieties that give us such options? Lastly - I have seen talk about AU (Auburn University) chestnuts, but I am not sure where I can get them...as I have only seen "dunstan" and "chinese" chestnuts for sale so far....
Click to expand...

I don’t think there is a chart. Or at least I haven’t found one. I purchased my Homestead as graftstock from Washington Chestnut. They offer an assortment of other Chinese graft stock as well as nuts. What a lot of guys do is purchase nuts then purchase graft stock of the same variety to graft onto the seed stock a few years later. For example, I’m growing some Sleeping Giant seedlings right now in pots. I’ll put them in the ground this winter and let them grow next year then graft Sleeping Giant graft stock onto them. Doing this gives me the best possible chance of having a compatible rootstock because the root stock is partially Sleeping Giant.

Matt


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
 
Route 9 coop will start selling nuts very soon. They have some "wildlife" varieties. They're mostly blight resistant.

Wildlife group is the only licensed seller of the AU "buck" breeds. I don't think they have any seedlings for sale this year. :( The Missouri University HARC does have AU homestead, which is a parent of the buck trees. You'll have to Google their info.

++Dunstan's are over marketed Chinese chestnuts, and an old cross with out of favor varieties that are no longer bred or sold.
 
Last edited:
look at morsenursery.com. they have many hybrids. they have a set of four different ones that drop from mid august thru mid november. they also have ones that come from northern climates. they have their own chinese x american cross. the two mature parent are next to each other in Michigan.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

Similar threads

pinetag
Where to find potted chestnut trees?
2
Replies
31
Views
6K
buckdeer1
B
possum
American Chestnut Question
Replies
6
Views
2K
DLH
D
dogghr
The New Coyote and Other Predators..... Can You Win?
7 8 9
Replies
161
Views
28K
Bowhunter
Bowhunter
Back
Top