Ohio DNR Tree Nursery UPDATE: No Buckeyes For Sale In Buckeye State

CINCINNATI (TDB) -- More on the shortfall of buckeye tree seedlings available for public sale at the state nursery in Marietta. This comes from Andy Ware, assistant chief at the Ohio Department of Natural Resources division of forestry. Andy writes the Daily Bellwether that it was a tough year for baby buckeye trees. He explains how the state's crop fell about 4,000 trees short of normal production.

"The quick answer is that we've already sold out of the 1,000 buckeye seedlings that were available this year. In the past 10 years, the Division of Forestry has grown and sold about 50,000 buckeye trees. That's enough to plant an area equal to about 100 football fields. Normally, we have about 5,000 to sell, but this past year saw a lower than normal germination rate for buckeyes. The trees grown for replanting in Marietta are bare-root seedlings and so they are lifted from the ground in late winter and early in the spring while the trees are still in dormancy. Their survival rate is tied to how quickly they are replanted during this dormant period. Unfortunately, buckeye trees are amongst the fastest trees each year to come out of dormancy and that is a key reason that more aren't grown at the nursery."

Andy wrote in response to this item in The Bellwether from two days ago:

CINCINNATI (TDB) -- State forestry officials have started their annual sale of seedling trees from the Ohio Department of Natural Resources' nursery in Marietta, where some two million baby trees will be shipped for planting by April. But a close inspection of the order form discloses that there are no buckeye trees available for purchase. This seems a major slight to the state's namesake tree. One would think Ohio would be working overtime to keep its buckeye stocks overflowing, and that the Marietta nursery would be the Fort Knox of buckeye trees. Is this a budding scandal?

Andy added that the state nursery has done yeoman work to keep Ohio green.

"In the past 80 years, the Division of Forestry has produced more than 500,000,000 seedlings for conservation and reforestation projects. That's enough trees to reforest some 1,000,000 acres in our state."