Seed nuts from Peach — Iola (I-31)

The variety

Peach came out of the same 1972 Ohio planting as Gideon and Amy, selected by Greg Miller, and takes its name from the fine fuzz on the shell — it really does feel like a peach skin.

The nuts run medium-large, reddish-brown, mild and sweet once cooked, and they peel easily, which matters more than most people realize until they have sat down with a difficult chestnut.

Its best quality is restraint. Many chestnuts overbear and shrink their own nuts in the process; Peach regulates its crop load, so the size holds up year after year. That reliability is why it is one of the six standard mothers Miller recommends for seedling orchards, and why it forms part of the well-known Peach-Qing-Kohr breeding trio.

One honest caution: Peach is more vulnerable to hard cold than most Chinese chestnuts, so we keep it away from the low ground where frost settles.

Iola in 2026

[TO BE WRITTEN — 2026 Ellington observations: bur set in the hard 2026 season, first drop date, nut size, shell splitting, whether burs drop whole.]

The tree

[TO BE WRITTEN — the mother tree's own note: where it stands and anything particular about it.]