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2	Objectives Discuss the importance of finding and pollinating mother trees in Tennessee and elsewhere in the original range of the American chestnut. Describe site preferences for flowering American chestnuts (potential mother trees) in southern Kentucky and middle Tennessee (the study area). Show size class distribution of flowering chestnuts in the study area. Discuss the incidence of blight on flowering chestnuts in the study area.
3	Objectives (continued) Suggest 12 top mother trees to pollinate in 2004 and list possible leaders of three pollination/nut harvest teams. Discuss and show photos of the prospective mother trees for 2004
4	The role of native American chestnut mother trees in The American Chestnut Foundation’s (TACF’s) breeding program Members of the various state chapters of TACF continue their search for the rare wild flowering American chestnuts to serve as mother (nut-producing) trees in TACF’s backcross program. The genetic diversity of the American chestnut continues to dwindle, thus it is important to conserve as much diversity as possible by developing many regionally adapted blight resistant strains of the American chestnut using TACF’s backcrossing strategy. TN-TACF members located and pollinated several new mother trees in 2003 and harvested about 1400 nuts statewide, and we plan to expand our effort in 2004. To conserve some of the best of the native chestnut germplasm, we are trying to clone large surviving American chestnuts through grafting.
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