American Chestnut Trees: Natural Extinction, or Victims of Bioweaponry?

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R: Chestnut trees and their almost complete extinction seem a good area for research.

"Today, most American Chestnut trees only live to be between 10 and 15 years old. And then they get sick and die. This didn't used to be the case. According to the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, they used to live for 500 years, even 800 years. They were huge, more than a hundred feet tall ..People used to say that a squirrel could make it all the way from Georgia to Maine without ever touching the ground, just jumping from Chestnut tree to Chestnut tree."

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"But then in the summer of 1904, a man named Hermann Merkel noticed something. He was the chief Forester at the Bronx Zoo... He noticed that the leaves on one of the American Chestnuts were brown and withering...there were small orange dots on the tree’s trunk and branches. First, he brought in gallons of fungicide in a horse-drawn wagon. But that didn't seem to have any effect at all. Whatever was making the American Chestnut tree sick was spreading. Hermann Merkel began to notice small orange dots on more and more trees. Next, it went from the Bronx down to the New York Botanical Gardens. Where 300 trees became infected and died. It spread across the East River into Brooklyn. 1400 dead trees in Prospect Park.

By May of 1908, The New York Times reported, quote, “Chestnut trees are doomed.” A researcher from the New York Botanical Garden told the paper that the disease was a fungus that appeared to kill the tree from the inside, getting underneath the tree’s bark and sort of starving it. He said, quote, “The spores from the fungi are formed in the fall and disseminated in the spring, not by the millions, but by billions. Everywhere there is a crack in the bark of the tree made by the wind or by the claws of a squirrel, these spores are deposited. And the work of destruction begins.” People wrote letters to the New York Botanical Gardens worrying that the blight was punishment for the quote, “Sinfulness, extravagance, and general wickedness of the people of the United States.” Scientists tried to quarantine the healthy tree. Farmers were told that if they saw any trees on their land that were starting to look as if they could be infected, they should chop them down right away. People came up with various ways to treat the blight: Drilling holes into the wood and filling them with rusty nails or pouring poison onto the trees’ roots. Boy Scouts had volunteered to search through forest to find any chestnut trees that had signs of the blight. And then chop them down and burn them. In February of 1912, scientists and politicians gathered in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania to talk about what to do. ...No one could stop it."

"As the science writer, Susan Frankel wrote in her book, American Chestnut, quote:
The blight killed between 3 and 4 billion trees. Enough trees to fill 9 million acres. Enough trees to cover Yellowstone National Park 1800 times over. Enough trees to give two to every person on the planet."
History of the American Chestnut

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"The American chestnut, Castanea dentata, once dominated portions of the eastern U.S. forests. Numbering nearly four billion, the tree was among the largest, tallest, and fastest-growing in these forests. Because it could grow so rapidly and attain huge sizes, the American chestnut was often an outstanding feature in both urban and rural landscapes.

Chestnut wood was rot-resistant, straight-grained, and suitable for furniture, fencing, and building materials.
In Colonial times, chestnut was preferred for log cabin foundations, fence posts, flooring, and caskets. Later, railroad ties and both telephone and telegraph poles were made from chestnut, many of which are still in use today.

Its nut fed billions, from insects to birds and mammals, and was a significant contributor to rural agricultural economies. Hogs and cattle were fattened for market by silvopasturing them in chestnut-dominated forests. Nut-ripening and gathering nearly coincided with the holiday season, and late 19th century newspapers often featured articles about railroad cars overflowing with chestnuts to be sold fresh or roasted in major cities."

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"All of this began to change at the turn of the 20th century with the introduction of a deadly blight from Asia. In about 50 years, the pathogen, Cryphonectria parasitica, reduced the American chestnut from its invaluable role to a tree that now grows mostly as an early-successional-stage shrub. There has been no new chestnut lumber sold in the U.S. for decades, and the bulk of the 20-millon pound annual nut crop now comes from introduced European or Asian chestnut species, or from nuts imported from Italy or Turkey."

"The chestnut blight was accidentally introduced to North America around 1904 when Cryphonectria parasitica was introduced into the United States from East Asia from the introduction of the cultivation of Japanese chestnut trees into the United States for commercial purposes. It was first found in the chestnut trees on the grounds of the New York Zoological Garden (the "Bronx Zoo") by Herman W. Merkel, a forester at the zoo. In 1905, American mycologist William Murrill isolated and described the fungus responsible (which he named Diaporthe parasitica), and demonstrated by inoculation into healthy plants that the fungus caused the disease. By 1940, most mature American chestnut trees had been wiped out by the disease."

"Mature trees often grew straight and branch-free for 50 feet and could grow up to 100 feet tall with a trunk diameter of 14 feet at a few feet above ground level. The reddish-brown wood was lightweight, soft, easy to split, very resistant to decay; and it did not warp or shrink. For three centuries many barns and homes near the Appalachian Mountains were made from American chestnut. Its straight-grained wood was ideal for building furniture and caskets. The fruit that fell to the ground was an important cash crop and food source. The bark and wood were rich in tannic acid, which provided tannins for use in the tanning of leather. Many native animals fed on chestnuts, and chestnuts were used for livestock feed, which kept the cost of raising livestock low."

"Removing blighted trees to control the disease was first attempted when the blight was discovered, but this proved to be an ineffective solution. Scientists then set out to introduce a hyperparasitic hypovirus into the chestnut blight fungus. The trees infected with virus-treated fungus responded immediately and began to heal over their cankers. However, the virus was so efficient at attenuating fungal growth that it prevented spreading of the virus from an infected fungus growing on one tree to that growing on another tree. Only the virus-treated trees recovered. Scientific opinion regarding the future of the stand varies."


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R: So we have these chestnut trees; they were enormous, all over the place, were a free food source for the poor, typically lived 500-800 years, and suddenly, they were mysteriously infected with a deadly parasite, which coincidently began at the same time they were injected with a "cure". At 500 to 800 years old, they probably presented a significant issue for chronology scramblers. It would have been easy to use dendrochrology to make deductions about our timeline that might have created questions about the presented narrative. Nowadays, if you have a healthy one, seems it's safe if the scientific establishment doesn't know it exists. If they get wind of it, they'll come and "protect it/try and save it for you" i.e take it away or inject it with a "cure", after which it becomes sick. I remember growing up with these gorgeous, massive, almost celestial trees, growing on the street I grew up on. They also lined the roads in nearby towns, and increased the beauty of the area, so profoundly. One day I noticed that they were all labeled , and later that year, cut down. Didn't matter how healthy they looked, they were all destroyed. It made me sad as a kid. Only now, as an adult does it strike me that these trees may have been purposely eliminated. I'm curious to hear other's thoughts about this.
 
Could it be that something changed (or was changed) in the atmosphere (with atmosphere being the envelope of gases surrounding the earth)?
I think that's definitely a possibility. They used to be called "The redwoods of the East". Maybe something did change that stopped sustaining them.


I'm definitely interested in the way that chestnuts allowed the poor to live off of the grid.
 
Ok, so what event(s) may be relevant in New York, 1904? This doesn’t seem atmospheric, this presents as a contagion with a ground/patient zero.

was it intentional? Or was it a consequence/byproduct of something else?

there are plenty of other trees in abundance with similar desirable traits, and dendrochronology is too much of a pseudoscience in my opinion to warrant arboricide at this scale.
 
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But then in the summer of 1904, a man named Hermann Merkel noticed something. He was the chief Forester at the Bronx Zoo... He noticed that the leaves on one of the American Chestnuts were brown and withering...there were small orange dots on the tree’s trunk and branches. First, he brought in gallons of fungicide in a horse-drawn wagon. But that didn't seem to have any effect at all. Whatever was making the American Chestnut tree sick was spreading. Hermann Merkel began to notice small orange dots on more and more trees. Next, it went from the Bronx down to the New York Botanical Gardens. Where 300 trees became infected and died. It spread across the East River into Brooklyn. 1400 dead trees in Prospect Park.
The ground zero dot is literally NYC. I wonder if that truckload of fungicide, wasn't fungicide. Interesting as well that the Botanical gardens was the next place they popped up. My experience of NYC botanical gardens was that it had an almost dead energy. I never thought about it until now but truly it was a feeling that something was missing. Lots of somethings. Perhaps it's a place where selected plants are preserved, and those that don't fit narrative are eliminated?
 
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I’ve been thinking on this for a few days now, but I can’t seem to formulate any sort of hypothesis. Nothing specific anyway.

I did find an interesting new blithe; beech leaf disease

apparently chestnut trees are in the same family:

chestnut, (genus Castanea), genus of seven species of deciduous trees in the beech family (Fagaceae)

There's a new tree disease spreading across NJ, and officials are asking for help

According to that article, we’re 10 years into this one already. Is this a coordinated attack on this genus, for some unseen quality or reason? I’m starting to get a problem/solution vibe from this. What’s the problem presented by diminishment of these trees?
  • less wood/resources
  • less photosynthesis (climate change)
  • less… chestnuts?
None of these seem like showstoppers. But what “solutions” could we be offered?
  • Forced into “green” materials
  • Forced into carbon credit systems

I’m just spitballing here
 
Same thing happened with Dutch Elm trees in the early part of the 20th century and by the 40's-50's an eradication program was in full tilt. Dutch elms are not as useful as the chestnut, not as tall, etc. but the similarity and time frame of 2 different species of trees being eradicated by fungi seemed coincidental to me. Was the atmosphere moister in the early part of the 20th century to allow/encourage fungal growth?
link
 
Maybe we’re looking through the wrong end of the telescope here. Maybe it’s not the elm or the beech or the chestnut tree. Maybe it’s “trees” that they’re after, and these trees are just the low hanging fruit?

sustainable farming has been replaced with monocropping, which is next to impossible without Monsanto’s GMO blithe resistant seeds. Maybe timber is the next milestone in the resource control operation?
 
Could it be that something changed (or was changed) in the atmosphere (with atmosphere being the envelope of gases surrounding the earth)?
I found this video today which though unverified, suggests at least one modern reason for a change in both the atmosphere, as well as water and land, and because of these, to all life itself. This may not be the original cause but today would certainly play an undeniable role in such things.

 
Could it be that something changed (or was changed) in the atmosphere (with atmosphere being the envelope of gases surrounding the earth)?
I have commented I think on the old site, that I wonder if there has been a fairly recent change in the atmosphere. If you look back not that far, you see people making a living selling lightning rods to every house and farm in America. There seemed to be a lot more lightning back in those days. You have the old Greek stories with Zeus shooting lighting all over the place, etc etc.

Then you have the speculation that church steeples and things were used to extract atmospheric electricity.

So my comment was that if there was a stronger source of energy in the atmosphere back in those days, not long ago, that I think it would be unlikely for living things to just ignore an ambient energy source like that.

I had speculated that maybe part of the reason we don't see giants now is that perhaps they derived part of their life sustaining energy from this increased electrical potential in the atmosphere. Possibly also those giant animals supposed from the ice age were also tapping into this energy.

So, if that was true, perhaps the very tall trees were also extracting energy from the atmosphere in the same way.
 
Maybe we’re looking through the wrong end of the telescope here. Maybe it’s not the elm or the beech or the chestnut tree. Maybe it’s “trees” that they’re after, and these trees are just the low hanging fruit?

sustainable farming has been replaced with monocropping, which is next to impossible without Monsanto’s GMO blithe resistant seeds. Maybe timber is the next milestone in the resource control operation?
You may be onto something. The pando aspen forest in Utah, considered the largest living organism in the world is also dying. Not from a parasite or fungus (unless you consider humans parasites). Climate change, predation, human encroachment, blah blah. The usual.
Link

For those who consider biblical prophecies worthy of attention, revelations tells us a third of all trees will be destroyed.
 
I thought the largest living organism was the honey mushroom in Oregon.

“Accurately guessing A. Ostoyae’s age is very difficult, the most agreed-upon range is 2000-9000 years old, a pretty wide range. The age estimates are based on recorded yearly growth records, ranging from 1-3 feet per year. The colonies haven’t always been this large, and scientists don’t know exactly what contributed to these colonies growing so large.” (Emphasis added by me)

I would hazard a guess that the environment we know today does differ from many other atmospheres that our realm has known in the past. Whether due to natural cycling, external factors, or energy/weather weapons unknown to today’s man… if this fungus’ growth has skyrocketed as of late, it does support a different environment in the not doing distant past.
 
Holy crap look at this image of the progress of the blight!! Looks like ground zero was NY. Seems a little suspicious to me!

this map just reminded me of this passage:

'Another circumstance may also be mentioned, as making a material difference between the country on one side of the Blue Ridge and that on the other, namely, that behind the mountains the weevil is unknown. The weevil is a small insect of the moth kind, which deposits its eggs in the cavity of the grain, and particularly in that of wheat; and if the crops are stacked or laid up in the barn in sheaves, these eggs are there hatched, and the grain is in consequence totally destroyed. 217To guard against this in the lower parts of Virginia, and the other states where the weevil is common, they always thresh out the grain as soon as the crops are brought in, and leave it in the chaff, which creates a degree of heat sufficient to destroy the insect, at the same time that it does not injure the wheat. This insect has been known in America but a very few years; according to the general opinion, it originated on the eastern shore of Maryland, where a person, in expectation of a great rise in the price of wheat, kept over all his crops for the space of six years, when they were found full of these insects; from thence they have spread gradually over different parts of the country. For a considerable time the Patowmac River formed a barrier to their progress, and while the crops were entirely destroyed in Maryland, they remained secure in Virginia; but these insects at last found their way across the river. The Blue Mountains at present serve as a barrier, and secure the country to the westward from their depredations'
 
I was recently reading some postulation about the Bradford pear tree and its potential health benefits. Then I learned of bans recently implemented and coming in Jan of 2023.

I’m not sure if there’s any true parallel here or if it’s some sort of apophenia in my head. The Bradford pear is claimed to be the blight itself, and the sale/plantation of these trees will likely become illegal in the next year. The tree was allegedly introduced to the USA from China due to its resistance to “fire blithe.”

mechanics aside, it appears to be another (potentially helpful) tree under attack albeit from a different vector.

The Bradford Pear Story - Clarke Monthly
 
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They actually ARE quite invasive. They also smell like dead fish. In my area they multiply at the expense of other more beneficial trees. They're not native to this area but since their introduction they've spread like wildfire.
They're beautiful when in bloom and can be used to make a honey type substitute.
 
I’d never heard of them before now, and I always take public narrative with a carafe of salt.
 

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