The 2025 Joint Annual Meeting of the Northern Nut Growers Association (NNGA) and Chestnut Growers of America Lansing, MI
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EmailPlanting seeds for continued collaboration and innovation between MSU and the nut-growing community
The 2025 Joint Annual Meeting of the Northern Nut Growers Association (NNGA) and Chestnut Growers of America (CGA) took place August 3–6 in Lansing, MI brought together a dynamic and diverse group of nut growers, researchers, and tree crop enthusiasts. This year’s conference, hosted by Bill and John Nash, drew participants from across the U.S. for a schedule packed with technical sessions, field tours, and social events.
The gathering highlighted Michigan’s role in the nut-growing world—particularly through the leadership and involvement of MSU in chestnut research, extension, and commercial innovation. The meeting covered topics such as nut tree agroforestry, chestnut cultivation across the Midwest, regenerative agriculture, land ownership and emerging fruit and nut systems and pathogens.
ABOVE: Sunday’s activities kicked off at Nash Nurseries, a seventh-generation family farm established in 1860, with a “Show and Tell” farm day hay-ride, where attendees viewed new tools, seedling varieties, and field practices in an informal and hands-on format. The day concluded with a social hour and welcome bbq dinner that gave old friends and new faces a chance to connect.
Throughout the conference, MSU’s influence was present in both the formal sessions and informal conversations, as several researchers and graduate students shared data, discussed trial results, and networked with growers interested in participating in future research projects.
Dr. Dan Guyer of Biosystems and Agricultural Engineering opened the meeting with the keynote address highlighting MSU’s long-standing chestnut program and its success as a model land-grant partnership that integrates applied research, grower support, and industry development. His talk set the tone for a day rich with technical, practical and cross-sector content. Dr. Guo-qing Song, from Horticulture, presented cutting-edge work on leveraging elite chestnut genotypes, micropropagation, and precision breeding to revitalize the U.S. chestnut industry. His talk emphasized the MSU’s commitment to developing and deploying advanced propagation techniques to support growers at scale. PSM graduate student Marc Friedman (Bonito lab) and presented on the ‘Persistence of Truffle Producing Fungi on Tree Nut Hosts’, results from MSU’s Experimental truffle orchard. PSM graduate student Dylan Warner (Bonito lab) presented on “Blight Resistance among Back Crossed Chestnut Cultivars Grown in Tissue Culture.” These sessions were followed by two interactive forums: one tailored to beginner growers, covering everything from species selection to postharvest handling, and another geared toward commercial operations, with panels on organic production and accessing export markets.
The second day of the meeting included presentations on topics such as hazelnuts, American persimmon cultivar genomics, pawpaw orchard development, and land access for new growers. PSM’s Carmen Medina-Mora, a long-time research assistant to the late Dennis Fulbright, (pictured here with Bill Nash, Nash Nurseries), presented: “Impacts of Pollination Biology on Chestnut Fruit Quality.” Erin Lizotte (MSU’s Integrated Pest Management) presented: “In vitro and Field Evaluation of Chemical and Biological Products for Chestnut Brown Rot Control (caused by Gnomoniopsis smithogilvyi) in Michigan.”
The event concluded with Wednesday’s field tours, which brought attendees to three sites deeply connected to MSU’s research and outreach work. The first stop was the Chestnut Growers Inc. (CGI) processing facility in Clarksville, a commercial-scale hub that now handles over 250,000 pounds of chestnuts annually from local growers. The facility was developed in part through collaboration with MSU Extension, and includes systems for cleaning, sorting, cold storage, and shipping.
Attendees next visited Beyer’s Orchard in Paw Paw—home to more than 65 acres of chestnuts—and finished the tour at MSU’s Rogers Reserve in Jackson guided by Dan Guyer and PSM’s Mario Mandujano, who demonstrates chestnut harvesting equipment (above).
Rogers Reserve is a state-of-the-art research site operated by MSU AgBioResearch, and features the region’s only mechanized fresh chestnut peeling line (above), capable of processing 2,000 pounds per hour, as well as a kitchen facility for producing chestnut flour, chestnut chips, hazelnut products, and pawpaw-based goods.
Dr. Gregory Bonito and Northern Nut Growers Association President Jim McKenna confer in an establishing chestnut orchard at Nash Nurseries. Throughout the conference, MSU’s influence was present in both the formal sessions and informal conversations, as several researchers and graduate students shared data, discussed trial results, and networked with growers interested in participating in future research projects.With record attendance, strong institutional support from MSU, and programming that blended cutting-edge science with practical grower experience, the 2025 NNGA/CGA meeting in Michigan was a tremendous success—planting seeds for continued collaboration and innovation in the nut-growing community.
Dr. Gregory Bonito and the Deadly String Band provided entertainment at the social before the conference banquet.
