MAINE SUNDAY TELEGRAM • July 14, 2024
By the end of this summer, the Maine Chapter of The American Chestnut Foundation will have planted almost 100 new wild chestnut tree seedlings at 10 locations around Maine. So, if the trees are all going to die, what’s the point in planting them? It’s all about genetics. The idea is that some of the trees will survive at least long enough to produce chestnuts, which are the seeds that can be planted to create a new generation of trees. Those trees would be genetically diverse, so scientists hope that at least one will have a magic formula that makes it immune to the chestnut blight. “Over the past 25 years, (the Maine chapter) has planted over 65,000 chestnut trees and produced many thousands of nuts and seedlings for others to plant.” Maine is the ideal spot for this chestnut-planting effort, as it has more surviving American chestnuts than any other state. ~ Tom Atwell