Dave, I've checked it out pretty thoroughly including emailing a college professor high resolution pics of the leaves, burs, and nuts. He is almost certain it's not a 100% American chestnut and from lots of pics and ID websites I checked out it's probably not either. But it does exhibit many of the traits of an American chestnut so it's probably a hybrid. There are some other pine and pine that seem to have been planted. There are a couple pine species not native to this area (seemingly planted in rows), and there are some huge pecan trees all growing in one spot. It seems unlikely they would have sprouted there with no other pecans nearby. I think the previous owner did some tree planting at some point.
The soil looks like that around the ponds because it's hilltop ground and there are lots of limestone pebbles. The good thing is there is lots of good red clay under the topsoil, and there is still some watershed sloping down to the pond from above. In the last picture the water runs into the pond from a field on the right. There were several different reasons I put the pond where it is but you'd have to see the lay of the land for it to make sense.
I hope the little wildlife pond will seal itself and fill up before long. My parents have dozens of little wildlife ponds on their Kentucky farm and it took some of them a year or two to seal and hold water. If it does eventually seal I'm going to use it as a fathead nursery. I don't remember the dimensions of the main pond but when I measured it came out to .3975XXXXX some odd number of an acre.
Eric
