ORIGINAL ARTICLES https://doi.org/10.1007/s10341-017-0364-4 Erwerbs-Obstbau Horticultural Characteristics of Chestnut Growing in Turkey Ümit Serdar 1 · Burak Akyüz 1 · Vedat Ceyhan 2 · Kerem Hazneci 2 · Cevriye Mert 3 · Ercan Er 4 · Engin Ertan 5 · Kıymet Senan Çoskuncu Savaş 6 · Vildan Uylaşer 7 Received: 7 February 2017 / Accepted: 17 November 2017 © Springer-Verlag GmbH Deutschland, ein Teil von Springer Nature 2017 Abstract Chestnut is one of the important nut crops in Turkey. However, studies on production, marketing, and characteristics of chestnut growers is very limited in the literature. Also, the type of chestnuts production changes depending on the region. This is the result of being chestnut is a natural forest tree. To find out the growing characteristics of chestnut in Turkey a highly structured questionnaire study is done. The purposes of this study, therefore, are (i) to explore the typology of chestnut growers; (ii) to outline the characteristics of the farms, their production, care activities (such as weed management, fertilization, orchard floor etc., major insects and disease problems and their management), and harvest characteristics; and, (iii) to analyze marketing characteristics (storage, marketing channel, market structure). The bulk of the research data are collected from randomly selected 279 chestnut growers all around the Turkey. Descriptive statistics were used for summarize the research results. The results of per characteristic were presented with detailed according to the regions. For this aim, recommendations are also provided for improving chestnut production. Keywords Fertilization · Growing care characteristics · Marketing · Weed management Gartenbauliche Merkmale des Maronen-Anbaus in der Türkei Schlüsselwörter Befruchtung · Wachstumseigenschaften · Marketing · Unkrautbekämpfung  Ümit Serdar userdar@omu.edu.tr 1 Department of Horticulture, Faculty of Agriculture, Ondokuz Mayis University, Samsun, Turkey 2 Department of Agricultural Economics, Faculty of Agriculture, Ondokuz Mayis University, Samsun, Turkey 3 Department of Horticulture, Faculty of Agriculture, Uludag University, Bursa, Turkey 4 Department of Horticulture, Black Sea Agricultural Research Institute, Samsun, Turkey 5 Department of Horticulture, Faculty of Agriculture, Adnan Menderes University, Aydin, Turkey 6 Bursa Province Directorate of Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Affairs, Hurriyet, Bursa, Turkey 7 Department of Food Engineering, Faculty of Agriculture, Uludag University, Bursa, Turkey Introduction As reported by Uzun et al. (2015), major agroforestry prac- tices in Turkey as well as in most part of the world are clas- sified as silvoarable, silvopastoral, agrosilvopastoral and or- chard intercropping areas. Production (63,750 tons per year) of chestnuts (Castanea sativa Mill.) in Turkey considered one of the centres of origin of chestnut (Castanea sativa Mill.) is very important for world markets (TU ˙ IK 2016). Chestnut is important for both horticulture and chestnut agroforestry in Turkey. Agroforestry systems include both traditional and modern land-use systems where trees are managed together with crops in agricultural settings. They are dynamic, ecologically based, natural resource manage- ment systems that diversify and sustain production in order to increase social, economic and environmental benefits for land users at all scales. Besides, agroforestry can contribute to improve the environment and the lives of people. One of the important plant for agroforestry is chestnut. Chestnut can be used for its nuts, timber and honey. K