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Chestnuts are a delicious low-fat food, the grain that grows on a tree. Once upon a time, nearly one in four of the trees throughout the Appalachain area, from Maine to Georgia, was an American chestnut (Castanea dentata). These trees provided bountiful crops of nuts every year, supporting people and livestock as well as wildlife. Then in a few decades in the 20th century, nearly all of these trees died as a result of a fungal blight brought into the country by a related chestnut species from China.

I just saw a surviving American chestnut tree in Pennsylvania a few weeks ago. I was almost as excited as if I'd seen a passenger pigeon. I put the tree's owners in touch with the American Chestnut Foundation. http://www.acf.org

If you know of any surviving trees, contact the American Chestnut Foundation. C dentata grows back from the roots after the main trunk dies from the blight, so it now survives as a shrub that tends to die back before it is big enough to bear nuts. Also, the ACF will soon be making blight-resistant trees available to the general public. If you live in an area that is not affected by the blight (such as Michigan or Wisconsin), you can even get wild-type chestnuts for planting.

There are some chestnut trees growing in the downtown area in Seattle. I don't know if they are American chestnuts, I don't think they are. One day I scooped a few up and tried roasting them, but they were so bitter they were inedible. Are there different types that aren't good to eat?

Were the trees in Seattle chestnuts or buckeyes (horse-chestnuts)? Horse-chestnuts are poisonous unless you process them the way the indigenous people used to.

American chestnuts have been found in the Florida panhandle.

http://plants.usda.gov/java/county?stat ... bol=CADE12

Oh, I found an article from a Seattle paper that said they are horse chestnuts. Good thing I only bit into one!

Bluestocking, thanks for the post on American chestnuts with the URL to the foundation's website.

Do you (or does anyone else) know if American chestnuts taste the same as European chestnuts? If there is a difference in flavor or texture, what is it? I love European chestnuts roasted in the oven. They are one of three favorite foods that keep me looking forward to fall each year (fresh apples and winter squash are the other two).

I think I remember having heard some folks from my gramma's generation say that American chestnuts are the best ones, but I have no idea why that might be.

Thanks, AK

So basically the entire population was wiped out in the US? I had no idea! Guess they'll have to change the xmas tune... chestnuts roasting on an open fire.... lol.

The American Chestnut isn't the same as what we know as chestnuts today... those are Chinese Chestnuts.

The American Chestnut was a huge (like California Redwoods) tree throughout the Appalachian range, wiped out when they brought Chinese Chestnuts, smaller, more ornamental trees to zoos and urban areas in the East. Those trees carried a blight that moved down through the Appalachians, eventually wiping out the indigenous tree.

You can still see many barns and some woodwork inside older houses in Ky and Tn (and probably other areas) with chestnut wood used for the lumber... it's a beautful wood.

Supposedly, what the old folks down in the Ky mts. told me, was that these chestnuts were far sweeter and tastier than the grainy things we know today from the Chinese Chestnuts... the Black Bear lived mostly on mast from these chestnuts in the past, and from what they told me, when the blight wiped out the trees, the black bear began depending more on acorns as mast, which are too bitter for bears to rely so heavily on... and this, in turn, made the bears meaner and always searching out something for their unsatisfied sweet tooth... thus, the problematic black bears of today's Appalachians.

One thing just leads to another. If they ever do manage to innoculate enough suckers sprouting from old chestnut stumps to replenish the forest, it will take hundreds of years to get them back.

Edit:

Photo of American Chestnut from 1915, which is huge size of these trees is obvious:

http://www.chattoogariver.org/content/q ... mchnut.jpg

Just wanted to add a few links to this fascinating thread. I love chestnuts--and had no idea about their history until I first read about it here.

The Roanoke Star's Mighty Chestnut Tree Poised to Make Comeback story (from 10/1/09)

American Chestnut Restoration Project

The American Chestnut Society (lists lots of upcoming events!)

Cheers!