Mostly successful direct seeded chestnuts

[chickenlittle]

Jordan, the main concerns are something eating the nut and what your germination rate will be. You could put out 2 nuts for each site to ensure one takes. If a mouse or vole can get under the tubes, they'll be eating good this winter. If you had a coffee can or tin can that could be pushed into the ground around the tube, that should help. Eventually you will want to remove the nuts or something may damage the seedlings trying to get the nut.

Waiting till spring worked good for me.

 

[Shedder]

What is the story on planting in the wild in winter?
I have heard conflicting ideas.
I have tried it and some came up but I have no clear idea of success rates.
Has anyone had luck planting chestnut\oak seed in winter?
I am at 45 north.

 

[TreeDaddy]

I direct seeded several hundred white oak and chinquapin oak seeds this november

I used 20 in tubes around each planting that were flush with the ground and staked

I had ~200 old 5 ft that i cut into "thirds"

Squirrels,feral hogs,etc slaughtered them

I will try again this Spring but will bury tube 3-4 in into ground

bill

 

[yoderjac]

Whats your guys thoughts about direct seeding now vs waiting till closer to spring time once trees start germinating??? If protected by a tube be ok to let seeds winter in planting site?

It may depend on location, but my thought is that if you are going to direct seed, mother nature is the best cold stratifier. The key is providing them protection. You might want to use 2 nuts per tube and cull later. If you wait you can be sure the nut has produced a radicle but that doesn't tell you much.

Thanks,

Jack

 

[Jordan Selsor]

Thanks guys. Hindsight I wish I would have waited till early spring. Knew I should have logged into Habitat talk before I did that lol
I only bedded my tubes in an inch or two so def need to try an do something. Not sure where I could come up with 15 coffee cans but could prolly get my hands on some scrap 6 or 8" pvc to slip over my tubes and drive down deep. Cut them 1ft or so you think?
Live and learn! Their is always next yr I guess! May have to reach out to Tap again for some more chinese chinkapins

 

[IkemanTx]

Has anyone ever thought about cutting down some gutter downspout into lengths for early protection?
They are usually about $12 for 10 feet, and I figure you could get quite a few pieces out of it.
That may be easier than finding cams.


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[Catscratch]

I used PVC with a cone of aluminum screen slid down the end. Plant in the winter so that tap root trees can put a root down as soon as they feel like it. The tree can grow over a foot tall before the screen needs replaced with a tube or cage.

A couple of pics of a tree I did this with for example.

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[Rubee]

I direct seeded Chinese chestnuts in the garden last fall under wire screen for rodent protection. None came up in the Spring. It gets below zero in northern Michigan during the winter where I live. So I assume chestnut seed can't survive such a long deep freeze stratification.

 

[Shedder]

I direct seeded Chinese chestnuts in the garden last fall under wire screen for rodent protection. None came up in the Spring. It gets below zero in northern Michigan during the winter where I live. So I assume chestnut seed can't survive such a long deep freeze stratification.

Mine did but I used Castanea dentata.

 

[weekender21]

I used PVC with a cone of aluminum screen slid down the end. Plant in the winter so that tap root trees can put a root down as soon as they feel like it. The tree can grow over a foot tall before the screen needs replaced with a tube or cage.

A couple of pics of a tree I did this with for example.

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I stole this method from catscratch last December and direct seeded ~15 white oak acorns with pvc and screen. I direct seeded another 50 in the same area without protection. All of my acorns were raided by rodents of some sort. We have ground hogs, Fox squirrels, bears, raccoons and chipmunks to name a few potential culprits. The PVC/screen were all knocked over so I’m guessing it was a larger rodent.


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[Catscratch]

I stole this method from catscratch last December and direct seeded ~15 white oak acorns with pvc and screen. I direct seeded another 50 in the same area without protection. All of my acorns were raided by rodents of some sort. We have ground hogs, Fox squirrels, bears, raccoons and chipmunks to name a few potential culprits. The PVC/screen were all knocked over so I’m guessing it was a larger rodent.


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That's a bummer! I haven't had anything get into one (yet), but I don't have groundhogs or bears so maybe that's a difference.

 

[H20fwler]

What is the story on planting in the wild in winter?
I have heard conflicting ideas.
I have tried it and some came up but I have no clear idea of success rates.
Has anyone had luck planting chestnut\oak seed in winter?
I am at 45 north.

That’s about all I do any more with them Dunstan and Chinese. I stratify nuts in fridge until March most have a good root sprout by then, I just randomly direct seed them into shrub strips and along woods with no protection .... success rate is probably around 10% and I’m fine with that for the little effort I put into it.
I have been planting around 50 plus nuts this way for about four years from our own trees. We already have plenty of bigger chestnuts that are screened and caged that produce nuts so the direct seeding project is just extra for fun now.
It is neat to spot young second gen chestnut trees while I’m walking around farms doing other stuff that are from a foot to six feet tall.

 

[buckvelvet]

Great thread @chickenlittle I really enjoyed this read. Specially look out my door at the horrible cold & white flakes starting to fall.

 

[IkemanTx]

Ya, I have enjoyed this thread as well. I plan on giving this a try with oaks and chestnuts next year.


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[John-W-WI]

There is a lot to Chestnuts that I don't know. I've looked into them several times but always manage to forget most of what I learn.

Quick question (google turned up various results that confused me even more). What USDA zone will chestnuts grow in. Specifically, how far north will they grow? Do I ever have a chance of growing some in Zone 4?

Thanks,

-John

 

[chickenlittle]

I'm not sure if I'd mess with chestnuts in Zone 4 for 3 reasons: winter hardiness, getting nuts to ripen before hard frost, and having nuts drop in hunting season. I'm not concerned about hardiness (planted in zone 6a) but most chestnuts have dropped and are gone by the time archery starts on Oct 1. Most years, we won't have a hard frost until mid to late October so a later ripening tree could still fill out the nuts.

Chinese chestnut grows in very cold parts of China and Korea but I do not know of any proven sources or genetic lines in the US for Zone 4. I think the approach I took here could work if you sourced chinese nuts from cold northern locations. Plant a bunch at high density and let cold winters thin them out year after year. If they live long enough to start getting nuts, you'll know if they will ripen early enough and drop at a useful time. Plus you could plant those nuts to start a line of "improved" trees.

 

[chickenlittle]

Update on my chinese chestnut orchard, year 4. Had a few trees flowers last year but no burs. 10-15% of the trees have burs this year. Deer have buggered up a few of the blueX tubes but generally everything going to plan. Hoping to have a chance to take a deer in these in a few more years.

 

[Bill]

That looks great!

 

[yoderjac]

Looking very good! Those trees are about the size of most of mine.

 

[chickenlittle]

Ready to drop chestnuts right before the start of archery. Excited about the future.