rewildingoz McCoy

good to hear! i dont even have my own land so there's not much point in acquiring germplasm.

maybe you can find info online, but i can try and recount how to do mass breeding if you really want to search hard for varieties with certain qualities.

if anyone else is reading this, the folks at cornell are supposed to be really friendly, just be polite and professional. 

you should be able to pick out gemrplasm listed here, and search based on specific qualities.
www.ars-grin.gov/npgs/

different groups hold different germplasm, so it can vary how easy it is to get anything.  but cornell has m. sieversii and ive heard first hand accounts of it being do-able.  also from what i've heard there is a sort of deadline in the winter that you have to request it by, or you have to wait for a year, anyway, good luck!

From talking to various people and direct observation, the blight kills them to the ground before they can produce and other diseases, including insects, take their toll on them. 

You might try over on http://www.chestnutsonline.com/forum/

They aren't hard to find in the ozarks, they are distinct once you know what they look like.

In Stamet's book Mycelium Running, there is an interesting account of the Chaga fungus being used to innoculate the American Chestnut against the blight.  If you search inside the book on google books this can be read.  If you read this and have more questions, post them here and PM me.  I've been reading a bit about this lately and have gathered some seed that are not resistant.  I can also point you to where to find wild, unresistant germplasm.  All in all, its a good idea to get some seeds from the foundation mentioned above.  Its worth noting they are the size of acorns and are a smaller tree so they will have a slightly different niche compared to a larger chestnut imo.

Mt.goat wrote:
Open source tractors?Now all we need is opensourse pitmines  and an opensourse army to ensure supply.Opensourse industrial civilization??what?

exactly.

Hello,

some of you may or may not be aware that folks from Cornell have gone on multiple expeditions to Asia, to the area where Malus domestica originated.  They've collected seed from Malus sieversii and have some planted trees.

If I were anywhere near NY state, I'd go collect some budwood or seed and have some for yourself (and the forum  ). 

wikipedia:
"Some, but not all, of the resulting trees show unusual disease resistance. The variation in their response to disease on an individual basis is, itself, a sign of how much more genetically diverse they are than their domesticated descendants."

I did the googling the other month and I'm not aware of any other source of this germplasm in North America..

https://secure.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/wiki/Malus_sieversii
http://hort.cals.cornell.edu/cals/hort/about/about_orchards.cfm
http://hort.cals.cornell.edu/cals/hort/about/cornell_orchards.cfm
http://www.nysaes.cornell.edu/pubs/press/germplasm.html old article from '96 about collecting the germplasm.  i think they've been back a few times since then.