Plant · P-547

Japanese Chestnut

Castanea crenata

Japanese chestnut is grown mainly for what it passes on rather than what it yields itself: it carries strong resistance to ink disease, a root pathogen that European chestnut has little defence against, which makes it a released rootstock and a breeding parent for disease-resistant chestnut hybrids. Its own nut is honest but unremarkable - edible and useful as a starch staple, though the flavour is rated very poor and the nut coarse - and it bears unusually early, fruiting while still just three metres tall. It also tolerates a wider range of summer climates than European chestnut, doing better in cool, humid summers that leave the European species undersized.