Show notes
In 1904, somebody noticed a sick tree at the Bronx Zoo.
Within 50 years, the fungus killing it had wiped out about four billion American Chestnut trees from Maine all the way down to Georgia.
In 2018, Richard Powers wrote a Pulitzer Prize-winning novel, The Overstory, which I loved. He set it in the early 20th century and made the American Chestnut tree the main character.
This fabled tree, which most of us had probably never even heard of at that point, was a tree that fed families and wildlife for generations, and yet most of us had never seen one fully grown, and we still might not, unless a small team in Syracuse pulls off a caper.
But last month, for the first time, the USDA cleared a forestry engineered to bring a wild species back, an American Chestnut carrying one gene from wheat.
Over the last 37 years of work, there has been progress made and mistakes made, new generations of researchers and partnerships that have ended. That's just called science. But we, and I use that term loosely, may be on the cusp of a breakthrough, and not just for the chestnut tree.
So what can I do about bringing back the trees we've lost?
My guests today are Dr. Andy Newhouse and Sophia Soriano. Andy directs the American Chestnut Research and Restoration Project at the College of Environmental Science and Forestry.
Sophia is a PhD student on his team, digging literally into the soil under these trees, inside and outside, and into the disease now spreading through our beech trees.
We talk about what we've lost, how one gene can help a chestnut survive, the mix-up that nearly sank the whole thing, and why anyone would give their life to a specific tree that they may never see full-grown.
You will leave this conversation knowing exactly how to help, from a walk in the woods to the next public comment period.
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