As a young man I worked at Catoctin mountain range for a summer camp. The building were all made of chestnut during the depression. We saw trees struggling to overcome the blight, growing a year or two only to succumb to the blight. This is a most worthy project.
It does make a lot more sense than those idiots who are trying to bring back the Wooly Mammoth. There is no place on Earth where they could survive today.