Production Practices and Quality Assessment of Food Crops. Vol. 1

132 S. Pereira-Lorenzo and A. M. Ramos-Cabrer
Figure 9. Local incompatibility between C. sativa cultivar and interspecific hybrid rootstock
(Pereira-Lorenzo and Fernandez-Lopez, 1997a).
6. PLANTATION AND MANAGEMENT
Chestnut is a traditional crop that has declined in importance due to diseases and
the low profitability, especially in the mountainous old plantations. However, its
stable fresh market and industry encourage the growers to establish new plantations
and maintain the old orchards in some areas of Europe. Chestnut orchards
are being considered as an alternative in non-traditional areas such as Australia
and California.
6.1. New orchards
New orchards should be established on slopes to allow good drainage. For nut
production it is essential to have mechanisation to reduce the necessity of hard labour,
and thus this could only be practiced on gentle slopes. If we do not have such
conditions then it is limited only for timber plantations.
Chestnut is species of long-term investment where returns are limited. Some
examples of intensification have been investigated, using irrigation and frost
defence or planting chestnut in hedges (Breisch, 1995). The main way to establish
new orchards is to use some of the following traditional models: Three different
options can be chosen for the cultivation of chestnut; timber, nut or nut and timber