Daily Archives: April 9, 2019

The American Chestnut

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Allen Nichols of the American Chestnut Foundation will speak at the Catskill Center, this Saturday April 13th, 2019 at 1pm on the restoration of the beloved American Chestnut. The Catskill Center is at 43355 Route 28  Arkville, NY 12406. This event has been organized by John Burroughs Woodchuck Lodge.

According to the foundation: “More than a century ago, nearly 4 billion American chestnut trees were growing in the eastern U.S. They were among the largest, tallest, and fastest-growing trees. The wood was rot-resistant, straight-grained, and suitable for furniture, fencing, and building. The nuts fed billions of birds and animals. It was almost a perfect tree, that is, until a blight fungus killed it more than a century ago. The chestnut blight has been called the greatest ecological disaster to strike the world’s forests in all of history.”

The AC Foundation is committed to “restoring the American chestnut tree to our eastern woodlands to benefit our environment, our wildlife, and our society. Unlike other environmental organizations, TACF’s mission is not about preventing environmental loss or preserving what we already have. The concept of our mission is much bolder and more powerful. It’s about restoration of an entire ecosystem and making our world a much better place than we found it.”