NORTHERN NUT GROWERS ASSOCIATION, INC.

Chestnut Breeding Program

For the last 15 years, the American Chestnut Foundation has cultivated 8,000 trees on a research farm in Meadowview, Virginia in order to breed an American chestnut tree that is immune to the blight. Since the Chinese chestnut resists the blight, researchers are breeding a hybrid that is one-sixteenth Chinese and fifteen-sixteenths American. They anticipate that the resulting tree will have the American chestnut's height and its sweet nuts.

The American Chestnut

According to Fred Hebard, a plant pathologist at the American Chestnut Foundation, the sweetness of the nut from purebred American trees is directly related to the nut's smaller size. A smaller nut converts its starches to sugar more rapidly. The flavor of European and Chinese chestnuts has suffered because they have been selectively bred over the years to increase their size. Also, true American chestnuts have a higher fat content than European varieties which makes them richer (10 percent as compared with 4 percent in the European varieties).

American Chestnut Trees in Central Park

In April, 2000, the New York City Parks Department planted eight purebred American chestnut trees in the north woods of Central Park in hopes that some would reach maturity before the blight attacked them. If the trees survive, they will be bred with the Chestnut Foundation's resistant chestnuts.

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