permaculture.studio dover, pennsylvania
← chestnut rights unknown

Bouche de Bétizac

Castanea sativa ‘Bouche Rouge’ × C. crenata CA04

The record

Parentage
Castanea sativa ‘Bouche Rouge’ × C. crenata CA04
Origin
INRA · Malemort-sur-Corrèze, near Brive, France · 1962
Rights
rights unknown — No patent, certificate, or trademark found in the sources consulted.
Nut
Large to very large, with very good flavour for a hybrid
Gall wasp
Completely resistant to Dryocosmus kuriphilus; the resistance appears monogenic and held in the heterozygous state
Blight
Not very susceptible

Description

A controlled cross rather than a found seedling, and the one to know if the chestnut gall wasp is in your area. The seed parent, C. sativa ‘Bouche Rouge’, is susceptible to the wasp; the pollen parent, an INRA C. crenata selection catalogued as CA04, is resistant. The offspring is completely resistant, and the way resistance segregates among its own seedlings points to a single dominant gene carried in one copy.

That single-gene basis is worth holding lightly. Resistance resting on one gene is resistance an insect population can eventually work around, which is a different proposition from the broad field resistance of a species like C. mollissima.

Where to find it

No source recorded. That does not mean the cultivar is unavailable, only that this record does not yet name a nursery carrying it. Point us at one and it goes in.