Larger Castanea henryi just down the road from the trees above.  This tree was in very good health and quite large for the area, about 65' tall and around 13-15" dbh.



Rock pile leading to C. henryi above.  The slopes here were very steep, approaching 80°+ in places.  As shown in this picture, leaves on this tree were right down to the ground and easily accessible for appropriate species identification.

Burs of Castanea mollissima, just down the road from C. henryi above.  Again, this tree is located down a very steep and rocky slope that leads to a stream below.  As I recall, the slope made this tree inaccessible for measurement. 



This is a view across the ravine from the main road along which we were measuring trees.  Across the ravine, from what we were told, is a forest just full of chestnuts, especially Castanea mollissima and C. henryi.  If you click on this picture and zoom in, you may be able to pick out the chestnuts by looking for trees with burs on them.  They were probably 20% of the trees we could view from the road on the other side.

Fog settling in over Nan Gongshan Park.  It tracked us all the way down throughout the afternoon and early evening.

Though hard to differentiate in this picture, this whole hillside is covered in planted Chinese chestnuts as part of reforestation efforts.  The trees toward the bottom of the hill are about 1-2 years old.  The trees at the middle of the hill are about 3-4 years old.  And those at the top of the hill are about 6 years old.  Previously, this area would be cultivated for other crops, likely corn and/or rice.

The mountains here are steep and big!  Farming has to be chore in this area.  While travelling through this area, Fred H. used this opportunity to tell one of his favorite West Virginia jokes.  Something like: "A fellow was going down the road in West Virginia and spotted a farmer lying in the middle of the road.  He went up to the farmer and said 'Hey mister, you alright?'.  The farmer said, 'Yeah, I reckon.  But that's the third time this week I've fallen out of my cornfield.'".  Actually, that's probably the kindest joke about West Virginia that was told during this trip.  But actually, we saw several cornfields where you definitely could fall out.  It's much steeper than WV.

Measuring a fallen Castanea mollissima with the local loggers.

Castanea henryi nut and bur.

Castanea henryi leaves and burs.  The leaves of C. henryi are more like those of Castanea crenata (Japanese chestnut) than any other species.  C. henryi leaves are typically more narrow (especially true of sun-leaves) and are totally glabrous (without hairs) on the underside.  C. crenata has many stellate hairs and 9-celled trichomes on the underside.

Songlin and Fred work their way up through the fallen trees.  All of those trees are chestnuts, either C. henryi or C. mollissima, cut primarily for firewood.  These trees were all approximately 28-32 years of age.

Cut portion of Castanea mollissima with Kim's pen. 

The orchard we visited in the Jihe region just south of Ankang.

Gall wasp on Chinese chestnut.  This appears to be an older gall, probably from an infection from last year.  Infection did not seem to be pervasive or detrimental at this orchard.

Fred Paillet stands next to an individual at the orchard that appears to be in very bad shape. The tree is infected with a couple of different kinds of fungi, including Cryphonectria parasitica. The cambiium layer on almost half the main stem appears to be missing.  Many of the trees at this site appeared in similarly poor health.

The substrate on which the trees were planted.  The substrate appeared very similar to a shale-type that one would find in the US.  I'll need to confirm w/ Paillet what this stuff actually was.

Our group poses in the orchard.  From left to right is Dr. Kim Steiner, Mr. Chen (Director of Forest Regeneration in Ankang), Sara Fitzsimmons, Dr. Fred Paillet, Dr. Fred Hebard, Mr. Cao ((Director of Extension for the Ankang Region (almost 9000 mi^2!!!), Dr. Lu Zhoumin (from Northwest Agricultural and Forestry University in Xi'an).

A woman shakes a tree in the orchard so she can collect the nuts that fall.  There were several local people at the orchard working to gather nuts while we were observing the trees.



The largest Castanea mollissima we saw on the trip.  This is what we all think is a "naturalized" specimen, likely from another orchard.  The tree was spared with the land was cleared for the current chestnut orchard.  I believe our hosts said the tree was about 200 years old.  But, also like the other trees in the orchard, it was not in the best of health.

View from the train as the sun sets.

As everywhere else on the trip, we ate well on the train.  Here, Songlin shares with us his passion for fish heads.  While I do not share his passion, I appreciate that he likes them.  And he is always welcome to those fish heads that are presented to me in the future.

Out on the town of Ankang.  Our first chance to buy chestnuts!  In the pan, the marketer roasts larger nuts of "ban li" while they call the smaller nuts in the basket at right from "mao li".  When pertaining to trees, the "mao li" would be Castanea seguinii and "ban li" would be Castanea mollissima.  Of course, it's very difficult to tell the difference between the species on nuts alone.  We had our suspicions that those in the market just call small nuts "mao li" and large nuts "ban li", without - necessarily - any connection to the actual species.  But we can't confirm that.

A scene from the part of the market with fresh produce.  It was incredible to see the amount of fresh meats and vegetables at this market.  I'll post some other images of the markets around Ankang later.  What even more impressive, though, is that most of the time, these carts are brought in by a person.  They aren't hauled by a large truck, but a person.  It was incredible to see farmers lugging these carts up the road - usually while smoking a cigarette.  They have to be very heavy.

More food!  In the foreground, you'll see what I *swear* was the Chinese version of beans and cornbread.  All I wanted was a little bit of tabasco or Frank's Red Hot and it would have been perfect.  It's hard to believe, but we ate _even more_ in Ankang than we had been.  Thanks to Madame Tang, we never had less than 20 dishes at any given meal.  You would be so full and really think there could be no way they'd bring more food, and there the waitresses would be, bringing in a whole fish, another stew, and a huge thing of rice.  Every time the door would creak open, we'd all cring, just knowing there'd be more food coming along.

Fred H. takes a picture of the highest point in Dalaoling.  The Chinese chestnut tree is located behind us.



Another view from our vantage point.  The highest point is up to the left of this picture.



Fred H. and Songlin get ready to take a height reading on a tree, probably a C. henryi.  The furrowed trees along the path behind them are either chestnuts or local oaks that look much like chestnut oaks and/or sawtooth oaks.



Also at site 2.  Doesn't this look like poison ivy?  I could have sworn this was poison ivy.  Our guides swore up and down, though, that it wasn't a poisonous plant.  Still, I wasn't about to go near it.  Though I didn't see him do it, I think Fred H. touched it.  About a day later, sure enough, he had a rash/blisters on his hands that looked exactly like poison ivy.  Just another plant that closely mimics what one finds in the forests of the eastern US.

Lunch at the Farmers house.  Note:  that ain't soda he's pouring in to my glass.  It's actually the local moonshine.  Now, I'm of Irish heritage _and_ a proud West Virginian, but I just couldn't drink the stuff.  If only they had aged it in some fine oak barrels.

Picture of our group with the farmer and his wife in front.  Unfortunately, I didn't catch their names. 

Beware of falling down, indeed!!  Most of the bridges to Tiger Roar Falls were done in a very .  . . local style. 

Tiger Roar Falls.  Of course this picture doesn't do it justice.  But you can imagine why they call it the "Roar" part.  And the "Falls" part.  The Tiger part comes from the rock in the upper left-hand corner of the pic.  Unfortunately, I didn't know that until after we started back, so I didn't get a good pic of it.  Anyway, it looks kind of like the head of a tiger.

Our first visit to a Chinese chesntut orchard in China.  The nuts are just about perfect for harvest at this orchard.

Wonderful signs.  More to come.

Weird, red, parasitic, plant things.  I think Paillet got the name of it.

Weird, purple, fungus stuff.  It almost looks like velvet.

Pigs ears with peppers.  Mmmmm!  Just like mom used to make.  (But I joke.  They're actually quite good!!).

The slopes of Dalaoling offer many chances to get your pants muddy.  And squat toilets!  In fact, that blue mat thing is underneath the shower.  Pretty ingneous, huh?  You can clean the toilet while you take a shower.  The muddy pants are mine.  I did that coming back down from Zehao's plot.  I got the muddiest.  I also got the wettest, mainly because I bit it at one of the stream crossings. 

What appears to be the juvenile form of those weird, red, parasitic plant things.  Once I get the name, I'll post it.  They appear primarily under the white pine-type trees that abound in the forests here.  Once I get the scientific name of the pine, I'll post that, too.

There are some of the cutest little mushrooms around.  The vegetation here is quite lush and there is apparently a good lot of rainfall here.  So there are lots of mushrooms all over the place.

This is a lot of pictures, so I'll post more in another post coming up.  Call it "other features of Dalaoling, part er".

We basically followed a stream up to Dr. Shen's plot.  There were some beautiful water features along the way.



The walk up was very humid.  Steamy!



Dr. He Wei stands beside a beautiful chestnut.  I don't remember if this was a henryi or segunii.  Suffice to say most looked this good and large.

Kim stands next to a large C. seguinii. 

Zehao stands next to another C. seguinii individual.

Sara stands next to a large, almost 30" diameter chestnut stump in the location of where our group first took data.  Species could not be confirmed, but it is certainly chestnut.

Li Daoshin, Songlin Fei, and Sara Fitzsimmons rest while climbing to take data on various chestnut trees.



Kim measures a large, 90ft. tall zhui li during the afternoon portion of data collection at Dalaoling.

The group enter data after a long day of climbing around and measuring trees.

Is the blight fungus causing these witches brooms?

Maybe this one has some?

This one looks very promising . . .

It most definitely is the blight!  First definite confirmed case with stroma and necrosis (though still not as bad as can be found on American chestnuts.  This specimen was a small sprout in very heavy competition in the understory.

We are still unsure as to what is causing many wounds and lesions on the other trees above.  There is an insect that causes similar damage found in the second picture.  What is causing the witches broom is unknown, though there are many burls that may be found at the base of each clump.  Several samples were sent with Dr. He Wei to sample.  We will be meeting with him in the afternoon of Wednesday, Sept. 25 to see if he isolated any Cryphonectria parasitica from those sample.

Dr. Steiner proves that we found Castanea mollissima on our trip.

Dr. Fred Paillet sketches the leaves of the Chinese chestnut along the road in Dalaoling.  The tree in question can be seen behind Fred.

A comparison of leaves of Castanea henryi (zhui li) - top - and Castanea mollissima (ban li) - bottom.