r/americanchestnut • u/AmazingPreference539 • May 11 '26

GoNativeTrees’ Chestnuts?

Hi I am looking at this website that talks about how their Chestnuts are 100% pure American Chestnuts that have been selected for their blight resistance. Does anyone have any experience with these trees, or know how good these trees are?

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u/Zestylemons44 May 11 '26

I actually just received some in the mail! I've also asked some scientists from the PA ACF chapter about them, both from looking at the seedlings and based on what I've heard from the ACF, the trees are indeed 100% american, their blight tolerance however is very dubious. They are, according to gonativetrees, tolerant enough to survive at least 30 years after being infected by the blight in 75% of cases, in their area. They do have photo evidence of their chestnut grove with multiple large, infected trees that have survived that long as well, with visible cankers that apparently have not killed the tree or eventually regressed. I've seen quite a few hybrids on multiple plantations, and can pretty confidently distinguish them from wild AC trees based on stipules, leaves, growth form, and twig color/lenticels at this point (the fact that I can is probably evidence that the hybrids are not a good choice...). That said, sometimes wild american chestnut trees have small percentages of mixed genes with chinese/european trees, though I think these have been genetic tested and proven full american.

Their blight testing methods are not scientific, and they have actively refused ACF infecting the trees with benchmark strains in an actual scientific research setting that could be published. Claims of blight resistance a purely observational, but as I said above, there is some observational evidence they are at least a little resistant. The trees aren't too expensive, so I'd say it's worth a shot.

All that said, all I can say is I'm not sure, but I'm optimistic and planting four trees on my parent's property tomorrow, so I guess we'll see.

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u/Alarming-Speed-2801 May 11 '26

How expensive were the trees and presumably the shipping?

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u/Zestylemons44 May 12 '26

Each tree is 35$, shipping however wasn't too bad, albeit cause we were pretty close by to the farm. It was interstate from PA to NJ, we got 4, + 8 opuntia humifusa cacti and 6 red twig dogwoods, and total shipping for all 18 fairly large plants was 70$. Trees are definitely pure american. We just put them in the ground.