the good & bad of GMO

http://www.chestnuthilltreefarm.com/store/pg/73-The-Most-Useful-Tree.aspx

THE MOST USEFUL TREE

The chestnut is the most useful tree in the world. There are 4 major species – American Chestnut (Castanea dentata), European Chestnut (C. sativa), Chinese Chestnut (C. mollissima) and Japanese Chestnut (C. crenata) and 9 less important species of the genus Castanea in the world. Considering the importance of chestnuts as a high carbohydrate food source for thousands of years, and the beautiful, rot-resistant wood that is used from everything from vineyard stakes, fence posts to siding and bridge timbers, and was a major source of tannin for tanning leather, is there any tree that provides this range of uses and value? Oaks, pines, and fruit trees each provide single uses for timber or food, and many have a larger total monetary value than chestnuts. However, no tree species in history has offered such a wide range of uses or importance. It is little wonder that chestnuts have been grown by every major culture, and transported in conquests and explorations to every continent where it could be grown.

CHESTNUTS AS FOOD

Until the introduction of the potato and maize from the New World, entire communities depended on chestnuts as a primary source of food and carbohydrate. The mountain people’s culture revolved around the chestnut. It was a staple in their diet, being eaten fresh after harvest, then the stored ones were consumed, then the dried chestnuts, and finally the sweet tasting flour, added to soups, stews, polentas, and made into cakes and breads. Dried chestnuts will last a year, providing food all the way to the next harvest. They were also fed to animals, and the rot-resistant wood was used in building everything from fences to vineyards to houses and barns.

Chestnut was survival for the peasants during bad economic times. After the fall of the Roman Empire, during the Middle Ages, and during the Great War and World War II, chestnuts were critical for the people of the mountains, providing a very valuable source of carbohydrate. It is only recently, with the movement of families into the industrialized cities, that the dependence on the chestnut tree and its culture has declined.

Traditionally, chestnuts were harvested by hand, raking the nuts and burrs into piles in the mountainside orchards. The nuts and burrs were transported by mule and cart to the homestead. Placed on the cool north side of a building, the nuts and burrs were covered with a layer of green chestnut leaves, where the nuts could be stored for several months.

To dry the nuts for longer storage, the nuts were placed on a raised ventilated floor of special buildings, where a chestnut wood fire was kept lit below, and the warmth and smoke from the fire slowly dried out the nuts. Once dry, the shells could be easily removed. To cook with these nuts, they simply had to be re-hydrated again by boiling in water. The dried nuts were also ground into flour with stone mills. The smoky sweet flavor is excellent, as the carbohydrate turns to sugar as the nuts dry.

Chestnuts were also an important food for livestock. The nuts were fed to hogs and cattle during the winter, and the animals were put out into the orchards after harvest to clean up the rest of the nuts. The sweet nuts impart a sweet flavor to the meat, and chestnut-fed pork is considered a delicacy in Spain and Italy. Chestnut leaves were also nutritious fodder for animals, and dried leaves were used as bedding for livestock during winter.

Chestnut forests also provide other delicacies. A number of edible mushrooms grow in association with chestnut trees – including truffles, porcinis (Boletus edulis) Ceasar’s mushroom (Amanita casearea), chanterelles (Cantarellus) and Russula mushrooms.

Honey made from chestnut blossoms is not very sweet, but has an intense, distinctive and astringent flavor. It is considered an aphrodisiac in Italy. Beekeepers depended on chestnut, as the trees flower late after many of the other tree species have finished.

USES OF WOOD

Chestnut wood has up to 20% tannin content, the highest of all tree species. This makes the wood extremely rot resistant. Chestnut trees, especially when grown in forest settings, grow straight and make excellent lumber which were cut into durable straight-grained planks or could be split easily for fencing and posts. Dr. Robert Dunstan described how you could put a chestnut fence post in the ground for 50 years, pull it up, turn it over, and get 50 more years out of the other side!

Because of this rot resistance, chestnut wood was used for ship-building, bridge timbers, railroad ties, exterior siding, barn and house posts and beams, flooring, doors, windows, exterior trim and any other area that was exposed to the weather. Chestnut tracks were used in the invasion of Normandy in WWII to get over the sandy beaches. Chestnut was also made split rail fences, fence posts, vineyard trellises, water well-casings, wine casks, barrels, baskets, furniture and caskets. Chestnut is truly a tree that carries people from cradle to grave.

Chestnut trees were coppiced for various uses. When the tree is cut, the stumps send up multiple sprouts very readily (this is seen today in America, where the roots survive the blight underground, and send up shoots again and again, to become re-infected with the blight). The coppice shoots were harvested at various cycles depending on the use. Vineyard trellises and stakes were cut after only 2-3 years, fence posts after 10-20 years, whereas saw logs were cut on a 50-70 year basis. Today there is still a strong demand for chestnut timber as an alternative to chemically treated pine for exterior uses.

Chestnut bark sided house, Linville NC All Saints Episcopal Church, Linville NC

In Linville NC, chestnut bark was used as shingles for siding many of the houses in this community. This was a traditional Appalachian building technique, and many buildings survive today, including the beautiful All Saints Episcopal Church, in which the entire building- beams, rafters and siding, was made of chestnut in the 1910. Unfortunately today, 100 years later, there is no more chestnut wood left, so Tulip Poplar bark has become a substitute, but it does not have the rot-resistance of chestnut.

Tannin is extracted from the wood for use in the tanning industry for dyeing silk and leather and in the production of varnish and other products. The wood was finely ground and the tannin leached from the wood by soaking in water. This traditional industry was common in the mountains of northern Italy, but is declining due to the use of substitute materials.

TSRF wrote:

I don’t know… We are really good destroyers (Shiva and Kali are very proud, I’m sure). Not quite sure how good we’d be at the Brahma gig. Everything needs to die, and if the American Chestnut can’t get off the mat by itself, then it probably needs to stay dead. Like the Wooly Mammoth, and the Neanderthals, and the dinosaurs, and God.

T, the list of things we eat that did not get off the mat themselves and were genetically modified (historically, through selective breeding) is extremely long. That includes pretty much every grain we eat, plus corn, and most of the fruit we eat.

It’s obviously the same if you eat meat. Chickens, cows, sheep, pigs…all domesticated and geneticallly altered animals.

Some examples:

wv wrote:

———————–

I dunno. I dont trust trees in general.

w
v

I like trees.

Which leads to a dog story.

Very early in Bondi’s existence with us I had to split some wood so I took him out with me, figuring he would just like to be outside when I was outside. I just envisioned him lying down and relaxing in the grass while I did work.

Nope. It took me a while, but after splitting log after log I looked over to check on him and he was clearly nervous. Me chopping wood freaked him out.

From then on, whenever I carried wood inside to put beside the woodstove, he would flee the room.

Our joke in the house was that when he talked about us to other animals, he would say in a terrified voice “have you seen what they do to trees??!!”

The author doesn’t really make a valid argument against GE chestnut trees.

I like the idea and am encouraged by the success the trees have had against the fungus up to now.

Genetic modification and gene editing will likely help a lot of species “on the brink”. Bananas are another important food crop being threatened by a fungal blight that could be saved by GE technology.

However, I’m not sure I’d like to see the GE chestnut trees released into the wild. Not because of baseless fear-mongering, but because when I go into a forest, I like to at least have the illusion that everything in it is wild and untouched.

So for that reason I’d prefer the GE chestnut trees be kept in orchards.

nittany ram wrote:

Are you going to get another dog?

Not right away. The way our schedules work, most dog care and training falls on me. That’s just a product of having a partner that works nights. Because Bondi was on chemo for nearly a year, a lot extra fell on me. At some points he needed 24/7 care. As a result of all that—I need a break. I can’t just leap into taking care of a new dog right away. So, probably next summer. This time I think we will get a shelter dog. I love pure bred aussies, they are great dogs. But, it’s a luxury to get a pure bred pup when there are so many shelter dogs that need homes.

zn wrote:

nittany ram wrote:

Are you going to get another dog?

Not right away. The way our schedules work, most dog care and training falls on me. That’s just a product of having a partner that works nights. Because Bondi was on chemo for nearly a year, a lot extra fell on me. At some points he needed 24/7 care. As a result of all that—I need a break. I can’t just leap into taking care of a new dog right away. So, probably next summer. This time I think we will get a shelter dog. I love pure bred aussies, they are great dogs. But, it’s a luxury to get a pure bred pup when there are so many shelter dogs that need homes.

We had to put down two dogs within a couple years. My wife and I told ourselves that our current dog, Fritz, would be the last. We’ll never get another dog after this one.

The pain of having to put a beloved pet down is too much to bear.

At the same time, it’s hard to imagine our lives without this big furry goofball. He brings us such joy.

So I guess the take home of all this is ‘never say never.’

nittany ram wrote:

We had to put down two dogs within a couple years. My wife and I told ourselves that our current dog, Fritz, would be the last. We’ll never get another dog after this one.

The pain of having to put a beloved pet down is too much to bear.

At the same time, it’s hard to imagine our lives without this big furry goofball. He brings us such joy.

So I guess the take home of all this is ‘never say never.’

Dogs are amazing and in fact all the evidence suggests that people n dogs are intertwined evolutionarily and linked species. That sounds more obvious than I meant it to. I guess I am trying to say people n dogs are REALLY REALLY intertwined evolutionarily. Like, a lot.

Plus I like dogs, I always have.

Losing them is hard though as you say.

….

zn wrote:

nittany ram wrote:

When I was a Park Ranger, there was a stand of Hemlocks at the Dingman’s Falls section of the Delaware Water Gap National Recreation Area that had never been logged. The trees there are 400 years old and 6 feet in diameter, and Hemlocks are slow growers.

I never knew you were a park ranger.

That’s right. I worked for the Department of the Interior as a Ranger for the National Park Service.

So while subversives like you were burning your draft cards, I was serving my country by pointing out poison ivy to retired people on bus tours.

And before you ask – yes, being a Ranger was exactly like this…

I saw this so now you have to 🤦🏼‍♀️🤦🏼‍♀️🤦🏼‍♀️#thatsnothowanyofthisworks pic.twitter.com/6ZBG7SAUiT

— Food Science Babe (@foodscibabe) July 31, 2020