Buffalo oaks

[treebucker]

  Forgive the title. I'm confused. I have no trouble sorting out the local white oak group but the red oak group is driving me nuts. Kentucky is in the middle of many species of the eastern red oak group. We also seemed to be blessed to be just on the tip of a few uniquely northern and southern species. But this all makes id that much more challenging. 

I've got dozens of tree id links. They seem to contradict each other and often times themselves. What one shows as scarlet looks like black on another, and black looks like bur on another, etc. So it goes. I found one site that has some of what I'm looking for Quercus spp. - Comparisons but they only show 4 species. I'm not having any luck finding a site that has side by side comparisons of all the species that grow around here along with the other most obvious unique features (besides leaves) that differentiate them.

And what about these hybrids?  How do you classify them? And consider that you know what to expect when it comes to the characteristics of the wood from Northern red oak - it's different from black oak. Some customers are very savvy to this. What about the hybrids? Sell it as mongrel red oak?

[SwampDonkey]

Scarlet and black oak leaves are indistinguishable from what I've researched. Scarlet oak leaves even look like northern red oak sometimes, black oak looks like northern red sometimes. And hybrids, that'l just kill it. So stick with red vs white and maybe separate the chestnut oaks by leaf shape.

I don't think you'd confuse black oak from bur. If they are showing identical leaves for those two oaks, then avoid that site. Unless they were talking about California black oak Q. kelloggii, which in most cases will have teeth on the lobe apexes.

[WDH]

I plan to do a post on identifying the oaks when the leaves come out this spring.  You have to go on several ID characteristics to be confident in differentiating the species.  Bark is a huge help when dealing with the red oaks particularly.  For instance, you would never confuse scarlet oak and black oak from the bark.  They are different as night and day.  Many of the pics in the books do not clearly show the distinguishing characteristics of the species, especially the bark photos.  When I am identifying an oak in situ, that is when I am looking at a real live tree, I use the bark first 85% of the time to identify the species, and use the leaves and acorns if there is a question.  Bark Rules!

[SwampDonkey]

I agree with WDH that bark is most often used for ID, and that other features have to be used in some cases. But, bark it is most often used because the person doing the ID has had a lot of experience with the species he is ID'ing. Sugar maple can be quite variable here depending on soil type and age. In my area the bark of sugar maple is tight with shallow furrows. I can go to another part of the forest and the bark is a lot more rough and shedding from the tree. If you have no experience with the species, bark is going to be at least as frustrating as the leaves. There was a fellow ID'ing red oak here by bark of logs in a yard, or he thought so, and it was all balsam poplar (balm-of-gilead). As suggested, I believe becoming familiar with as many distinguishing features as possible will bring you a little closer to ID'ing your trees. Young tree bark of several species look very similar.

[SwampDonkey]

So what are these stems?

[WDH]

Beech, maybe........

Swamp, I agree that ID by the bark takes experience and that some trees have bark that can vary a good bit by site and age.  You have to "see em" a number of times to get comfortable. 

[jon12345]

I'd have to make an educated guess on that one as largetooth aspen, but it does kinda look like our hard maple when it's young.   

So how are they doing 7 years later, SD?

[SwampDonkey]

That Jon's a clever feller. 

I have not been there to the stand for a year, but I would assume they are doing well. I have some thinning nearby a group of them that were regenerated in 1995 from suckers and they are already 45 feet tall and 6 inches on the but.  They are twice the size of the trembling I'm thinning through.

[Phorester]

Here, every species in the red oak family - northern red oak, southern red oak, sacrlet oak (the few trees that grow well enough to get a decent log out of), black oak, cherrybark, pin- when sawn into lumber are all labeled and sold as red oak.  There are not enough differences to separate them. Buyers go by lumber grade which will take into consideration knots, stain,  and other defects from species to species.

Is there enough variation in the sawn wood between members of the red oak family to be concerned about separating out each species?  I would think that every buyer has his own preferences as to lumber, and he's going to buy the boards he wants regardless of what species he wants to call them.

[WDH]

Like you say Phorester, red oak is sold as a group, and not by species.  However, some folks are partial to one species or another and it is good to be able to ID the species in case it is important to them.  It may also be important to the sawyer to know the species that they are sawing, if for just knowledge sake.

Swamp, it did look like a populus sp. but I figured you were being crafty and I over-analyzed the situation .  We don't get no populus around these parts (sorry about the double negative  ).

[treebucker]

Unfortunately I have a hard time remembering everything I read and where I read it. I seem to remember one site saying scarlet oak not being all that desirable and shumard being highly desirable.

I have been sawing mainly red oaks. Some of the wood looks perfect in its (unfigured) color while other looks poor. All are red oaks but you sure wouldn't classify it as the same wood unless you were strictly following guidelines.

Two poor examples came across the mill last weekend. On the surface the bark appeared the same as another member of the red oak group I've seen on the mill. This other member always seems to produce a nice coloration and predictable quality in its lumber.  But these mystery reds always seem to produce poorer quality and coloration. The bark on these two mystery reds had an orange cast under the surface. I think I read somewhere that black oak has this orange cast but I think the same site said there was one other in the red oak group that also had an orange cast, albeit not as pronounced.

These little, but easy to spot, clues that help to sort red oaks from one another seem to be scattered around here and there on different sites. I haven't found a single source that gives a comprehensive side by side comparison.

The only way I could graduate to id'ing the red oaks strictly by bark would be to use the other clues to narrow it down, note the appearance and uniqueness of the bark, and repeat the process under varying circumstances until I got the hang of it. Unfortunely, pictures rarely capture the true appearance and texture of the bark. It's not the same as being there.

[WDH]

One characteristic alone, including bark, is sometimes not enough to distinguish between species.  Bark can help to limit the number of potential species to only a few, but even then, sometime to be sure you need leaves and even acorns.  Another issue is site and age.  Even the best species can produce poorer lumber if the tree is on a poor site or if the tree is young so that the desired wood characteristics have not had time to develop (good clored heartwood and knot free lumber).  While the wood cell configuration is all the same in the red oaks and essentially undistinguishable between species, the way they grew (site, age etc.) is not always the same.  Therefore, the lumber quality varies.