diff --git a/nltk/chunk/regexp.py b/nltk/chunk/regexp.py
index 860a562012..63855b0f3c 100644
--- a/nltk/chunk/regexp.py
+++ b/nltk/chunk/regexp.py
@@ -831,9 +831,13 @@ def __repr__(self):
 # this should probably be made more strict than it is -- e.g., it
 # currently accepts 'foo'.
 CHUNK_TAG_PATTERN = re.compile(r'^((%s|<%s>)*)$' %
-                                ('([^\{\}<>]|\{\d+,?\d*\}|\{\d*,?\d+\})+',
+                                ('([^\{\}<>]|\{\d+,?\}|\{\d*,\d+\})+',
                                  '[^\{\}<>]+'))
 
+
+
+
+
 def tag_pattern2re_pattern(tag_pattern):
     """
     Convert a tag pattern to a regular expression pattern.  A "tag