Smithgall Woods is Helping to Bring Back America Chestnut Tree

Smithgall Woods is Helping to Bring Back America Chestnut Tree. . , A Valuable Tree , The American Chestnut (Castanea dentata) was a dominant tree in eastern U.S. forests until the mid-twentieth century. Over four billion chestnuts spanned from Maine to Florida, making up one quarter of the hardwood trees in the region., Towering chestnut trees averaging five feet in diameter provided shade to the forest floor, keeping it cool and moist., Unlike oaks, which produce acorns sporadically, chestnuts produced a reliable nut crop each year. Chestnut trees played an important ecological role as a source of food for many animals such as bears, deer, small mammals, and birds. They also provided great habitat for nesting birds., Chestnuts were an important part of Native American diets and helped to stave off hunger for pioneers. Chestnut leaves were used to treat whooping cough. The lightweight, rot-resistant lumber from American Chestnuts was useful for barns, fence posts, homes, and furniture. The inner bark extract was used for tanning leather., A New Fungus Among Us , In the late 19th century, Japanese Chestnuts (Castanea crenata) were imported into the U.S. as ornamental trees. Unfortunately, the trees carried a hitchhiker, the parasite that causes chestnut blight. This parasite is a fungus that becomes embedded in the tree trunks. Japanese Chestnuts and other Asian chestnut species have developed resistance over time to the fungus. American Chestnuts, however, are completely defenseless against this. The blight thrives in the bark but does not survive in the root. Because of this, the American Chestnut currently lives as a small understory species that sprouts from the roots of trees containing the fungus. These sprouts almost always become infected, die, and resprout from the unaffected root in spring. Infected trees develop orange colored cankers that spread around the tree, cutting off the flow of water and nutrients, resulting in the death of the tree., Bringing Back the Chestnut , What is so important about bringing back the American Chestnut? Reestablishing the American Chestnut tree will allow it to reclaim its ecological function as a provider of habitat and food for many forest animals. American Chestnuts can be reintroduced on the market as food for humans. Lumber from American Chestnuts may serve as a sustainable source of wood. Rot-resistant Chestnut does not need to be pressure treated with chemicals and does not release harmful chemicals when it breaks down. American Chestnuts may also be a viable source of biomass for clean biofuel production, as they grow large relatively quickly., The orchard at Smithgall Woods started out as a "test orchard" in which just a few pure American Chestnuts and hybrids were planted to test the site for suitability as a "breeding orchard." Once the test site is found suitable, planting will be expanded to include hybrid trees bred using wild American Chestnuts from Georgia, Timeline , 1870s- Japanese Chestnuts carrying blight imported into U.S. , 1904 - Chestnut blight discovered in the Bronx Zoo in New York , 1940s and 1950s - Blight swept throughout Appalachia, infecting more than 3.5 billion mature American Chestnut trees , 1946 to 1963 - The USDA made an unsuccessful attempt to develop a blight resistant hybrid with American and Chinese Chestnuts trees , 1983 - The American Chestnut Foundation (ACF) formed with the purpose of breeding a "Restoration" hybrid using a new technique , 2006 - Scientists at the State University of New York's Environmental Science and Forestry lab planted the first non-hybrid chestnut tree containing blight-resistant genes , 2009 - ACF planted hybrid chestnuts on U.S. Forest Service land in Virginia, Tennessee, and North Carolina. 2014 - Smithgall Woods plants 7 pure American Chestnuts and 2 restoration 1.0 hybrids in a test orchard, For information on how you can be involved in the revival of the American Chestnut, visit The American Chestnut Foundation website at www.acf.org.