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Home → Publications → American Chestnut Proceedings → 1978 → The West Virginia Department of Agriculture American Chestnut Program

The West Virginia Department of Agriculture American Chestnut Program

The objective of the West Virginia Department of Agriculture chestnut program is to improve blight resistance in American chestnut by selective breeding. Living American chestnut trees displaying blight resistance are being located throughout West Virginia. Presently, two of the more promising trees are heavily cankered. Most blight-resistant trees occur singly in isolated areas.They produce no nuts because of the lack of other chestnuts for cross pollination. To solve the pollination problem, a seed orchard of blight-resistant American chestnut is being established by grafting American Chestnut scions to Chinese chestnut rootstock. Although there have been incompatibility problems, the technique appears to be successful enough to warrant continued work. Open pollinated seed from the orchard will be collected, stratified, planted, and the resulting seedlings screened for resistance. The selection and breeding of blight-resistant progeny will be repeated in an effort to produce an American chestnut with a high degree of blight resistance.


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Author(s): J. Bruce Given, S. Clark Haynes

Publication: American Chestnut Proceedings - 1978