SPRING (when the tiny new leaves and staminate catkins combine to lay a pastel tint of the artistic superstructure of limbs). They are among the very best sources of food for wildlife and are gathered and hoarded by birds and rodents.īEST SEASONS: FALL (for the rich fall color and the acorn crop, which draws a fascinating array of wildlife like a magnet). The acorns will sprout without a dormancy period and begin to germinate as soon as they fall from the tree. Acorns of oaks in this group ripen in one year. White oak is in the taxonomic subdivision of oaks known collectively as the white oaks (section Quercus, formerly subgenus Lepidobalanus or Leucobalanus see the taxonomic discussion under Quercus shumardii). The fruits are acorns, familiar to anyone who ever walked an oak woods in early fall. Consequently it lived as it had since before the birth of the nation, well exceeding what otherwise would have been its natural life span, to awe every visitor who knew enough about trees to comprehend its antiquity. Its enormous spreading crown was braced and cabled for many years to postpone its inevitable death from windstorms or lightning. It was 80 feet (24m) tall with a canopy that spread more than 100 feet (30m), and its huge limbs were supported by a hollow trunk 10 feet (3m) in diameter. Nothing else ever quite matched it, even though every portion of its natural range boasts notable and noble white oaks. national champion white oak was the famous old Wye Oak, which grew in its own park, Wye Mills State PARK, Maryland, until a storm brought it down in June of 2002. Like most oaks, it establishes from acorns sown by wildlife into openings caused by wind throw, fire, logging, or other disturbance, and grows slowly but relentlessly to become, after the first century or two, the lord of its locality. It lives for several centuries under favorable conditions, becoming more massive and picturesque with every passing human generation. White oak is a dominant tree of many landscapes. And the tree that might claim to be the flagship species of the genus is white oak, the state tree of Connecticut, Maryland, Iowa, and Illinois. ![]() ![]() Just as maple is the official tree of Canada, oak has been selected as the national tree of the United States. Much of what I cover for white oak applies as much to the rest. More than sixty oak species are native to the United States and Canada, and many more can be found in Mexico. ![]() Oaks occur naturally in vast numbers in each of the forty-eight contiguous states but Idaho, though cultivated oaks grow there. As we tree planters gain the wisdom and patience of experience and begin to focus more on the potential immortality of our work, native oaks are the trees we turn to throughout most of North America. DESCRIPTION: Oaks suffer form a short-sighted demand for instant gratification in the landscape that often results in a misguided preference for trendy but short-lived exotics.
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