Previous investigations seem to show that certain pure strains of Japanese and Korean chestnut are resistant to the blight. Blight cankers may be found upon them but they are less easily infected and suffer less than the more susceptible varieties. With this as a working basis, considering the results that have been attained in other fruit by selection and hybridization, the situation is hopeful. Prof. Collins said at the Harrisburg Conference in February that "There is no reason to doubt that we may eventually see an immune hybrid chestnut that will rival the American chestnut in flavor and the Paragon in size". In southern Europe chestnut orcharding is a well established and profitable industry. In the United States chestnuts have been considered a marketable commodity ever since the Indians carried them to the settlements and traded them for knives and trinkets. The demand has always exceeded the supply and at the present time about $2,000,000 worth of nuts are imported from Europe annually. With the development of the better varieties of the American nut has come an increased activity in the United States and the chestnut orchard industry promises to become one of very large importance. It has an added advantage that the trees can be grown upon the poorer types of soil which are not adaptable for farming or the raising of other fruit. At the present time there are in what is known as the blight area of Pennsylvania, or eastern half of the State, about 100 orchards ranging from 12 trees up to 400 acres in extent. These orchards are in varying stages of blight infection, some of them being almost entirely free, due to the attention which has been given them. In order to protect such orchards the Commission is compelling the removal of infected trees within a certain radius of them. As you know the blight has been a very serious factor in this industry. Some of the orchards have been completely annihilated and the income reduced from several thousand or more dollars per year to nothing. Whether or not the blight will completely wipe out the orcharding industry is a subject of large importance. Personally I believe that chestnuts will be raised commercially in Pennsylvania in increased abundance, and as the various phases of the blight subject are brought to light, keeping the disease under control can be more easily accomplished. At the present time this is being done in certain orchards by the present methods of examining the trees often, treating each infection, or removing the tree. If this policy is successfully pursued for several more years it will demonstrate conclusively that chestnuts can be grown in spite of the blight and this will mean an opportunity to use vast areas of waste land in Pennsylvania and in the other states, in a highly profitable manner. * * * * *