Reader Melanie wants to know the differences between Chinese chestnut trees and American ones, since Chinese chestnuts are some of the only trees available to plant. I’m certainly not an expert on trees, Melanie, but I’ll tell you what I know. Though the chestnut tree species that produce the largest nuts come from Eurasia, there were species of chestnuts in America before European settlers arrived here. Native Americans ate the fruit of these trees for millennia.
Sadly, American chestnut trees were almost entirely wiped out when a chestnut “blight” was accidentally introduced in 1904, most likely on some Japanese chestnut saplings imported to the East Coast. By 1940 chestnut blight had killed an estimated 4 billion chestnut trees in the States. The Appalachian Mountain forests, which were about 25% chestnut, were especially hard hit. The blight also killed off most of the imported European species which were nearly as susceptible to blight.
As of now there’s still no treatment for chestnut blight, but researchers have been trying to produce American-Japanese or American-Chinese chestnut hybrids that they hope to reintroduce to American forests in coming years. For now Chinese and Japanese chestnuts are the species that thrive the best in North America.
On the differences, Chinese chestnuts have smooth-rimmed leaves where American chestnut leaves are serrated. They also tend to spread at the trunk where American chestnuts grow straight (this characteristic made them superior lumber trees once upon a time). The fruit of Chinese chestnuts is also larger than American species. Hope that helps, Melanie!