Care

Drawing from interviews, participant observation, and ethnographic work, there was a widespread emotion of ‘care’ and ‘caring’ for and with the Chestnut but more attentively looking at care as a form of relation (Puig de la Bellacasa 2012; van Dooren, 2014).

When volunteering at a Chestnut orchard, I assisted another volunteer with planting sprouted Chestnut nuts that were 15/16ths American Chestnut, and 1/16th Chinese Chestnut (a part of the American Chestnut Foundation breeding program).

Lying in a bag of soil were around thirty nuts that have started sprouting by sending a root radical in search for water and soil nutrients for the organisms’ ascent into the air. When the volunteers would remove the nut with a radical from the bag, they did so with a level of deep care, moving slowly, making sure to not break the root radical which would thus terminate the future of the hybrid nut.

Then the nut was placed very deliberately in a certain orientation for the best chance for the chestnut to live. Lastly, dirt was carefully placed atop the nut then given a firm press to ensure the Chestnut’s hopeful survival.

Sara also discussed a type of care for the Chestnut through her work with the species by saying:

“I mean, of course, I care about the ecology and the tree itself…There’s something very charismatic about it, and I can’t explain it other than like, it’s a beautiful leaf, like it’s very aesthetically pleasing, it grows really fast. It’s a fighter, you know, just for this thing to hang on for so long after so many insults. And for it to keep going. It just, it wants to be rescued.”

Sara,
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Another type of care was expressed by Rex on a larger scale when discussing the care for the forests and assemblages of plant species:

“From the earliest days there’s been this concept of stewardship, of taking care of the world we live in so that these grand kids that come along will inherit at least a good of world as we did”

Rex, Wednesday June 28, 2023

I do not believe care is an outright emotional political ecology as seen with anxiety or hope, however, ‘care’ becomes an emotional political ecology when looking towards the reasons for having and expressing care. The reasons for caring varied from religious beliefs, forest ecology, restored historical relationships and sense of communities. These develop into different ethics of care held differently between individuals within the region further complicating how humans care for plant species experiencing extinction.