Successfully Germinating Bur oak and Red oak.

[SwampDonkey]

Well as you can see I had to change this post. Based on close investigation I have discovered the germinates are two oak species.


I collected the bur oak in late September from a source in Carleton county. The red oak came from Victoria county about the same time. I stored the seeds in a container in the fridge for 4 months. A couple of times I had to use a solution of bleach to remove fungus and the final time I used some lime sulfur to control it and washed it off, then dried the seeds each time. The bleach didn't seem to kill the fungus. I think it's good to use fungicide in case some fungus is on them. I would do this with butternut or walnut to in case some cankerous fungus tags along. I also have some walnut and Canada plum potted as well, awaiting germination.



This is my first bur oak Q. macrocarpa



A red oak Q. rubra. Toothpick for scale.

I think they emerged over night because I saw nothing during the day.

I have been keeping lights on them from 6:00 pm to 10:00 pm.

Patiently awaiting my other trees.

[SwampDonkey]

Here are the oak after one week. The smaller oak on the left is bur oak. It's slower growing.




I think my walnut and plum will have to undergo more stratification. Hopefully they will germinate next spring.  I recently read that they both require about 18 months stratification.

[Mooseherder]

Man that took off in a weeks time eh?
Looks like a great project.

[SwampDonkey]

I'm not sure if the little bur oak is going to make it, but it's still green. Seems to have stagnated. It seems bur oak can be difficult and slow. I'm putting the light to them, that really helps. Just like fertilizer. Wait until next week's photo.

[SwampDonkey]

Well the little bur oak never made it folks, it was a dud. Sad. 

But the red oak are as vigorous as ever. This is after 4 weeks from germination.





One of them is having a second growth spurt, a lamas growth, while the other two are setting buds to do the same. You can see the orangie tip of the new leaves emerging. The color of the leaves during early leaf emergence usually gives an indication of flower color. Remember than when selecting roses in the spring for the garden. Remember, lamas growth will also produce a ring of early wood, but it produces a false ring.  The new early wood pores added on since the previous late wood do not start abruptly between one another. Then additional late wood gets laid down since width of early wood is the same no matter if it comes from lamas growth or normal annual increment.



This is a normal ring pattern with true annual rings. With false rings, that abrupt 'red' line does not exist and in fact the late wood leading into the new false ring will begin to have pores of increasing size again. Remember, every bud break will produce those large early wood pores. 

The original micrograph was 5x magnification. I generally use a 10x hand lens to view end grain.

[Tom]

You would have to really go on a treasure hunting program to find those first rings.  They will be buried at, or below, ground level by the time a saw takes that log off.   It would be fun to find the first ones and hang them on the wall, wouldn't it?

[SwampDonkey]

Well we can remedy that Tom, get your garden clippers out. 

[WDH]

Those red oaks look happy .

[SwampDonkey]

Five weeks in. 

[SwampDonkey]

Well, I'll bump this thread up to watch and see if the one bur oak I have this year makes it. I also looked at my plum seed and walnut seed. The plum looks like it's still alive and the walnut I cracked open is a little withered, but was tasty. The plum tasted just like an almond and in good shape. We'll see. 

[Mooseherder]

When are they going outside?

[SwampDonkey]

This spring. The oaks pictured are out there now. Under ice and snow.

[Banjo picker]

I have a small white oak in the kithen in a pot.  It came up last fall, when I brought a few acorns in that I had found late and wraped up in a paper towel ,  meaning to plant in a day or two.  But this one put its tap root through the paper towel and has graced the counter all winter.  I am going to plant it in view of the back porch, put a wire basket around it,  tell the boys if they shoot it they will be cut out of the will , and hopefully watch it grow.   Tim

[SwampDonkey]

 


Bur oak is the only native white oak species to New Brunswick. Only place in the Maritimes it grows, hundreds of miles from it's continuous range. Textbook of dendrology doesn't even show it on the map here, but shows a small area in south central Maine, which is about the same size area as in NB. Shows up in Native Trees of Canada, but the native range is a little bigger than mapped. Land clearing has about done it in here.

[Banjo picker]

Burr oak is the only native white oak species to New Brunswick. Only place in the Maritimes it grows.

Burr and overcup are a might hard to come by here in NE Miss, at least in my limited area.  When i get some acorns i will try to get them a niche.  Tim

[Jeff]

I've got some Bur Oak coming from the Chippewa County soil consevation tree sale to try on my property. I bought a lowland mix that includes 4 each of the Bur Oak, Black elderberry and High bush cranberry

[Banjo picker]

I've got some Bur Oak coming from the Chippewa County soil consevation tree sale to try on my property. I bought a lowland mix that includes 4 each of the Bur Oak, Black elderberry and High bush cranberry

Do you think they would ship to Miss.? Tim

[SwampDonkey]

The largest concentration of bur in NB is in the Grand Lake area, which is a large lake and wetland area that feeds the lower reaches of the Saint John River. My source is from a woodlot that has changed hands about 4 times in ten years. We almost bought it once, but they had too big a price. That's probably why people don't seem to hang on to it too long. The taxes would be almost nothing for it.

[SwampDonkey]

Well, the bur oak from last fall never germinated. The Canada Plum never did anything either.

The potting soil is now growing raspberry cuttings. 

Try again next year. 

[nb_foresttech]

SwampDonkey it looks like you are doing a great job at experimenting with some of our local rare species. I have been thinking of trying to grow a few trees and plants from seed. Burr oak, Butternut, Sugar maple and possibly even Black raspberry. I have seen a few Burr oak in my travels now I will have try to remember where they were. I might be contacting you if I collect the right seed for advice.

[Banjo picker]

I planted the white oak this week, but to the front yard instead of the back.  I have been checking on the butternut that i got form DL but nothing yet.  I think somebody on here said they might take 2 years.?   I am a little impatient I guess.  Thats why I like White Oak, they sprout almost before they hit the ground.   Tim

[SwampDonkey]

Banjo picker, maybe 2 years, but a lot will come this year to. Mine never come up through the ground until July the following year from the previous fall harvest. So, seems they take longer than 2 weeks when conditions are right.

[SwampDonkey]

Well, here is the 2009 crop of bur oak off a couple of remote trees I have been keeping an eye on. These are what I could reach.



I beat the squirrels this time.

[SwampDonkey]

I was doing a little more reading on bur oak from the USDA site. It says our northern race of burr oak may be recognized as another variety since it's acorns are smaller and germination is best when stratified. It also seems bur oak will hybridize with other white oak species. I'd be interested in a planting a couple in the yard to compliment my well established white oak from NH. To get some seed from that cross would be awesome. My white oak is quite slow growing, but very hardy, and it says bur oak is very slow growing as well. My soil is also calcareous, which is preferred by bur oak but is also damp like bottom land in Ohio (American elm, red maple, black ash cover type), but not flooded. They can't take flooding. The presence of northern white cedar is also a good indication of calcareous soil, but our soils maps show this region of NB to be calcareous and about the best place in NB to grow trees.

[SwampDonkey]

Well, yesterday I sunk those bur oak seed I collected last fall into some new potting soil.

Wish me success this round.

[Brian Beauchamp]

Good luck! By the way, they can take 'flooding', just not prolonged periods of inundation such as in a swamp setting. They are pretty prevalent in our flood plains along the rivers here. Also, have you noticed any swamp white oak up your direction?

[SwampDonkey]

Brian, I guess I don't know who your asking. But, if me, we don't have any other native oak species except bur oak and red oak here. But we are the only Maritime province to have bur oak.

[WDH]

Y'all are "oak challenged" in NB 

[SwampDonkey]

For sure, not only species-wise. But being sparse as they are, it's a challenge to perpetuate them. 

[Brian Beauchamp]

Yep...asking you Swamp!

Strange how swamp white is everywhere around you...even skipped over into Nova Scotia somehow according to the USDA distribution map:
http://plants.usda.gov/java/profile?symbol=qubi

I was hoping you could change the distribution map! 

Brian, I guess I don't know who your asking. But, if me, we don't have any other native oak species except bur oak and red oak here. But we are the only Maritime province to have bur oak.

[SwampDonkey]

There's no swamp white oak in Nova Scotia neither. We have more species here in New Brunswick than Nova Scotia does.  The furthest east in Canada for that species is on the Ontario-Quebec border at the mouth of the Ottawa River and islands. Nova Scotia doesn't have butternut nor basswood either and we do. The Saint John River valley is a haven for species that don't exist in other areas of the region and diminishing because of farmland clearing. Just about all the best ground is growing taters.

Natural history of the Saint John River Valley