The Western Chestnut

Greetings to all! I hope this growing season has finally settled down for at least most of you. This has been an unusual weather season for many of us in the west and I’ve pretty much learned to expect the unexpected this year.

Many of you have orchards that are well into pollination and it’s time to start thinking about collecting leaf samples for foliar analysis. While soil tests are important, it is not an indicator of what nutrients your trees are actually taking up. Foliar samples may help you adjust your orchard’s nutrition program during the growing season. We’d appreciate receiving your foliar test results from healthy trees so that we can continue developing a database of what works well for chestnut growers. Please visit www.wcga.net/foliar.htm for additional details.

Ben and Sandy Bole have worked hard to organize this year’s annual meeting and orchard tour it will have already been held by the time you receive this newsletter, so I hope I will have enjoyed seeing you all again. I also thank them for their dedication in organizing this important event. Your board has been working on some important matters, particularly a possible name change that will be voted on at our annual meeting. Some of you have provided input on items and this is appreciated very much. Please keep your thoughts and ideas coming into your board members.

This will be my last letter as your President and I wish to express my appreciation to the membership for allowing me to be of service to this fine association. I also wish to express my thanks to the rest of the board for their support. I also especially wish to express my thanks to our Newsletter Coordinator, Rachel McCoy, who has done an outstanding job in taking over this newsletter production. This can be a challenging task and I encourage all of you to see where you may be of help to your association and consider submitting newsletter articles. Rachel’s contact information is located in the adjacent column.

All the best,