In Praise of Castanea: The Great Chestnut Tree
The mighty, beautiful and generous chestnut tree — her ecological importance, as a keystone species and as an ally to mankind throughout history, cannot be overstated. Prior to the chestnut blight in the early 1900s the now nearly absent American Chestnut, once called the Redwood of the East Coast, was more than 4 billion strong! Its sweet and nutritious nuts (equivalent in nutritional value to brown rice) rained down bountiful sustenance to wildlife and provided a reliable annual food source to countless communities of people.
In isolated Italian mountain villages the chestnut was and is still called l’albero de pane, the bread tree, since it consistently provided food security in the form of a versatile food source that could be eaten fresh, roasted, candied, in soups, ground into flour for baking or polenta (like grits) in times of abundance or famine.
Unlike other nut trees, the chestnut does not have what are called “masting years.” The tree produces catkins (flower analogs) long after the last frost, which means she produces a full crop every single year, rather than a large crop every year or two, like other nut trees. A young tree, at 10 years of age, can produce nearly 15 pounds of nuts (50-100 pounds at full maturity)! And a healthy chestnut tree can produce fruit, sequester greenhouse gasses, provide habitat and food for over 150 years!
Perhaps, like me, you look forward to the tradition of roasting chestnuts on an open fire on cool winter days with your loved ones, maybe you aspire to provide a sustainable and regenerative food source for your family and friends, or perchance you wish to kindly invite beautiful wildlife near your home. Regardless of your ambitions, I hope you’ll invite the lovely and bountiful chestnut tree into your life and landscape!
Chinese Chestnuts, Castanea mollissima, are the most blight resistant species of chestnut. Their nuts are exquisitely sweet. I’ve grown seedlings in airprune beads so that they have especially healthy, hardy and fibrous roots. This process was done in accordance with regenerative permaculture principles, without pesticides or herbicides, with the intention of generating living garden soil as a byproduct.
You will need at least two chestnut trees within 100 feet of each other to have successful pollination, so make sure you get at least two for yourself or one for you and one for (each of) your neighbors!
Here’s what I have available for planting this winter/spring, 2023:
‘Grade A’ Bareroot Chestnut Seedlings (12” and taller): $12/seedling. [Stock: 20]
‘Grade B’ Bareroot Chestnut Seedlings (5”-10”): $35 for/ 5 seedlings. This is a great opportunity to get many trees at great price! These seedlings are very healthy and will produce lovely and fast growing productive trees with a just a little extra TLC. [Stock: 40+]
Please send any questions or inquiries to Kerem via email at treeunion.forest@gmail.com.