Dunstan chestnut seeds source?

[Bc4abc]

Planted 15 Dunstan's this year from a nursery and would like about 15 more Dunstan trees...i grew 20 Chinese this year from seed and would like to try growing Dunstan's, anyone have Dunstan's seeds they would like to send my way ? Willing to buy....

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[chickenlittle]

Here is a commercial source that many have used. They have an orchard of Dunstan brand trees.
http://www.chestnutridgeofpikecounty.com/

 

[Bc4abc]

Thanks

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[yoderjac]

That has been my source recently as well. I seem to have less mold issues with nuts from them.

Thanks,

Jack

 

[Bc4abc]

Jack .....what is your success rate...in other words if I wanted to
end up with 20 trees how many seeds would you buy?

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[yoderjac]

It really varies wildly. There are years where everything clicks and I end up with more trees than I can handle and other years everything that can go wrong does. I start mine in the middle of the winter under lights. I find the nuts are the least expensive part. I typically buy as many as I can handle with my facilities. You can cull to your best trees whatever that number is. Another option is to put some in cold stratification and some store without media or added moisture. They will sort of go into suspended animation. If you have mold or other germination issues, you can then add damp mix to the second batch. If the first batch works out, the second batch will still be quite tasty.

Thanks,

jack

 

[Mitch]

Can you buy bareroot seedlings from them? From their website, it appears they just sell the nut....?

 

[chickenlittle]

Chestnutridge just sells nuts. If you want Dunstan brand seedlings, you need to buy them from Chestnut Hill (www.chestnuthilltreefarm.com) or their many retail partners. If you want other chinese or chinese hybrid seedlings, there are lots of other sources but the only ones sold under the Dunstan trademark come from Chestnut Hill.

 

[OakSeeds]

Can you buy bareroot seedlings from them? From their website, it appears they just sell the nut....?

You can only buy nuts by the pound; one pound will usually have 35-40 seeds. You should get 20 or more trees out of a lb. Good luck!

 

[Bc4abc]

You can only buy nuts by the pound; one pound will usually have 35-40 seeds. You should get 20 or more trees out of a lb. Good luck!

Exactly what I needed to know...thanks



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[yoderjac]

Can you buy bareroot seedlings from them? From their website, it appears they just sell the nut....?

And to flesh out what Chickenlittle was saying. Dunstan is one of the early Chinese/American hybrids that is blight resistant. It has been marketed very well and hyped in most of the hunting magazines. While Dunstan chestnuts have a lot of good characteristics, so do many Chinese and other hybrids. The reason I use them is because they are no more or less expensive to grow from nuts which is what I do. If I was buying seedlings, I probably would not pay the premium for Dunstan.

Now, one thing to keep in mind is that we are not really growing Dunstan chestnuts from seed. "Dunstan" started out as a cross that was then propagated by grafting. It was also registered as a trade name. So, Chestnut Hill can sell whatever they want under that trade name, but for it to truly be a Dunstan variety, it needs to be a grafted tree. Chestnuts are fairly true to seed compared to many trees, so what we are actually doing is starting seedlings from nuts that came from Dunstan trees. You will notice that many places have been shut-down from using the trade name Dunstan without permission from Chestnut hill. You will notice that Chestnut Ridge does not call them Dunstan chestnuts. You have to call and talk to the owner to find out that their orchard was originally planted with grafted Dunstan trees.

One more interesting fact is that a chestnut is sexually incompatible with itself. So, I grafted Dunstan tree can not pollinate another grafted Dunstan tree since they are the same genetically. So, when you are buying grafted chestnuts, you need enough trees of different varieties close enough to each other since they are primarily wind pollinated. With chestnuts grown from nuts, you don't have this issue since each tree is genetically unique.

Just some interesting things to consider when you start working with chestnuts.

Thanks,

Jack

 

[NYHUNTER]

NH do you moisten the potting soil too or just do the paper towel cause I also have mixed results with mold,I add small amount of moisture to sphagnum moss, 25 nuts per bag, one bag will have mold next will not,probly too damp been growing chestnuts for 4 yrs and still have some mold issues if I try to push in crisper till spring before pulling them out

 

[NYHUNTER]

Has anyone tried putting them in potting soil and placing in the freezer I would think it would be just like being outside in the ground? I have not tried it yet but I'm gonna put a few in this winter

 

[yoderjac]

Jack,
I've been growing chestnuts from seed for 6 years. I've never had the mold issues you seem to have. I get the seed nuts. Put them in a pot of well water for a few hours. Dry them off with paper towels. Put 50 in a gallon ziploc with Miracle gro potting soil. Put a moist paper towel at the top of the bag and fold the top over. Place in the crisper of my fridge and let them be. 95%+ germination rate with no mold for 6 years. I keep it simple and don't over think it.

Are you cross contaminating them some how? Seems like you must be doing something that's causing mold.

Also as a side note. I wouldn't toss nuts with worm holes. Keep them separate but you can still get 70% germination with them.

I've come to the conclusion that 90% of the mold has to do with exposure at the source or improper handling. Like you I had zero issues with mold when I first started. I figured "this is easy, I'll try to make things better". So in the next year, instead of cold stratifying them and then planting them immediately, I decided to try to "time" things. I put them in cold storage with no added moisture for a bit. I then added the moist medium to and let them cold stratify. Rather than letting nature take its course like the first year, I removed them from cold stratification after 60 days and tried to force them to germinate by adding heat and moisture. That was a big mistake and the mold issues that year were likely caused by this improper handling.

Going back to my original method produced good mold free results again.

Then a couple years ago I had a startling revelation. I got nuts from Chestnut Ridge and Wayne was nice enough to send me some Chinese chestnuts as part of his project. I handled them all exactly the same (but separate). I had very little if any problem with the nuts from Chestnut Ridge but a huge mold problem with the nuts from Wayne. It was his first year. I asked him how he collected the nuts. He had picked them off the ground and put them in buckets.

Clearly, the nuts I got from Wayne had exposure to mold spores sitting on the ground for an unknown amount of time. Perhaps his climate was also conducive to mold. I understand mold can move quickly from nut to nut when they are sitting in a bucket for any significant period of time.

So, here were two batches of nuts from different collection sources, handled the exact same way, one had few mold issues and the other significant.

My conclusion at this point is that I can try to push things and cause mold issues, but if I do things right, the mold issues seem to be a function of how the nuts were collected and stored before I got them and what the conditions were at the time and place of collection.

When folks are just starting out, there are a lot of mistakes that can be made. Mold is just one of them. Probably the most frequent is improper watering. Either way, it is really hard to predict how many trees one will get from X number of nuts. This thread shows a pretty significant difference in germination rate from two fairly experienced growers based on the number of days of cold stratification: http://www.habitat-talk.com/index.p...transferred-from-old-forums.5712/#post-111201

Thanks,

Jack

 

[yoderjac]

Has anyone tried putting them in potting soil and placing in the freezer I would think it would be just like being outside in the ground? I have not tried it yet but I'm gonna put a few in this winter

First, you are better off using long-fiber sphagnum than potting soil for moisture retention. If your nuts are not exposed to mold, it doesn't matter, but if they are, it has natural antifungal properties that potting soil does not. I'm not saying that potting soil won't work, just that it depends on mold exposure during collection.

Second, cold stratification requires above freezing temperatures and moisture. The minimum is 60 days. If they moisture content is low, cold stratification slows. If it gets low enough it stops. The same goes for temperature. Cold stratification stops when the temperature gets below freezing. In nature the soil temperature warms and cools over time and most nuts don't germinate. Those that get the right amount of cold stratification and have the right conditions germinate. Also keep in mind that temps a little below freezing won't kill the nut, but a hard freeze can. I'd be careful and know what your freezer temperature really is before attempting this. Also keep in mind that they won't be cold stratifying while in the freezer.


Thanks,

Jack

 

[Mitch]

Please forgive the ignorance.....but I guess i'm just not sure. Aren't chestnuts pretty good size? I did this with bur oaks last year and only could get 2 in a zip lock bag. I had pretty good success with the burs i've got going right now. Would I use the same procedures for chestnuts?

 

[yoderjac]

I use gallon ziplock bags. I use way more bags than I need because if I do get a mold issue with a nut, I don't want that mold to move to all my nuts. Ziplock bags are not expensive. I don't believe bur oaks require cold stratification. I think in some cases, if seeds don't germinate immediately you can get some improvement from 30 days of cold stratification. Chestnuts require cold stratification. They need 60 to 90 days of cold stratification to germinate.

Thanks,

Jack

 

[asmith]

One more interesting fact is that a chestnut is sexually incompatible with itself. So, I grafted Dunstan tree can not pollinate another grafted Dunstan tree since they are the same genetically. So, when you are buying grafted chestnuts, you need enough trees of different varieties close enough to each other since they are primarily wind pollinated. With chestnuts grown from nuts, you don't have this issue since each tree is genetically unique.

Just some interesting things to consider when you start working with chestnuts.

Thanks,

Jack

Jack, does this mean that these Dunstan Chestnut trees we've been buying from Walmart will not pollinate each other nor produce nuts? I'm confused.

 

[Bc4abc]

I would think that it would be unlikely that all the trees u bought at Walmart were from the same stock......at.least I hope not bc I bought 15!

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[chickenlittle]

The Dunstans you bought at Walmart are seedling trees grown by Chestnut Hill. Each seedling is genetically different and will cross pollinate each other and produce big chestnuts.

If you had a bunch of grafted trees that were all the same cultivar (clones with identical genes) they could not pollinate each other. Few people grow grafted chestnuts.