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sawtooth oak update

Started by bitternut, October 12, 2004, 08:06:57 PM

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bitternut

WOW!!!!!  Finally got to see what sawtooth acorns look like. I only found a few of them but maybe more will be following in the years to come. They are not mature yet and seem to be behind the native red oaks or my burgambles for acorn ripening. I think they are supposed to hang on the trees quite a while also. The picture shows one good acorn and a few of the small ones that never seemed to mature.





Brian_Bailey

Hey, that's not fair Herb :o!

Mine are all like the ones at the end of your thumb :'(.
WMLT40HDG35, Nyle L-150 DH Kiln, now all I need is some logs and someone to do the work :)

Tom

You know,  when a flower isn't ferilized, its ovary will often look like a malformed little fruit and then fall off.  Do you  reckon that y'all are experiencing ferilization problems?

Brian_Bailey

That's a good question Tom.  I've wondered the same thing.

Because my trees are all growing in close proximity of one another I figured pollination should not be an issue. But, maybe it is.

I'm going to go an check my trees again.  Maybe I'm concentrating too much attention on these little ones that I'm missing the bigger ones. Ya know, like hiding in plain sight kind of thing. :D :D
WMLT40HDG35, Nyle L-150 DH Kiln, now all I need is some logs and someone to do the work :)

bitternut

Well pollination could be the problem if they require another type of oak as a pollinator. My sawtooth are planted close together also and there seems to be plenty of flowers on the trees in the spring. I also have red oaks planted very near that also have flowers in the spring but are not producing acorns yet. Maybe we just need a good rooster tree like a lot of fruit trees seem to need for pollination. I have faith that sooner or later they will start living up to their reputation as acorn producers. Hope I live long enough to see it.

Brian, you have to look real close as they blend in real good with the leaves. They might be a little easier to see now since the leaves are starting to lighten up and turn yellow. If they produce a fraction as many acorns as leaves we would have tons of acorns. Never saw a tree that produced so many leaves. They also stay on the tree till the next spring. Good luck in your search.

SwampDonkey

hmmm

bitternut:

Is the sawtoothed oak in the same family as the red oaks? Judging from the mature acorn, I'm guess its similar to burr oak, which is a white oak.

Anyway, I was going to make these comments....

White oak species have female flowers that if fertilized the year they emerge, they become mature acorns that year.

Red oak species are not the same, as they require the first year for pollination and a second year to mature such as the northern pines. (white pine, red pine, jack pine and Pacific North Western pines). Those tiny acorns look like the overwintering immature acorns of red oak species.

This differentiates the oaks.

cheers

"No amount of belief makes something a fact." James Randi

1 Thessalonians 5:21

2020 Polaris Ranger 570 to forward firewood, Husqvarna 555 XT Pro, Stihl FS560 clearing saw and continuously thinning my ground, on the side. Grow them trees. (((o)))

SwampDonkey

I see you already knew the differene between the oaks by reading your earlier thread. The only other problem I can think of is frost hardiness. If those seed come from TN and your growing them in New York or higher latitude, that can be quite significant. Here in the Maritimes we have zone 6 near Halifax and Zone 3a in Northern New Brunswick. That makes quite a difference to stock brought from the southern part to the north. You get bud damage, die back and stunted growth patterns. But, we can grow larger balsam fir up north than they can in Nova Scotia and it lives longer. Go figure  :P
"No amount of belief makes something a fact." James Randi

1 Thessalonians 5:21

2020 Polaris Ranger 570 to forward firewood, Husqvarna 555 XT Pro, Stihl FS560 clearing saw and continuously thinning my ground, on the side. Grow them trees. (((o)))

SwampDonkey

Stephen_Wiley was also giving you advise, in your other thread, as to the maturity of your trees. Those were words of wisdom, I dunno if you'll realized it.

On black spruce plantations, and we're not talking about seed orchards here, cone production is very prolific in young trees but the seed viability isn't that great as the trees are too young.

In seed orchards those trees are grown from grafts or rooted cuttings from mature trees. Saves trying to climb 50 feet for cones.
"No amount of belief makes something a fact." James Randi

1 Thessalonians 5:21

2020 Polaris Ranger 570 to forward firewood, Husqvarna 555 XT Pro, Stihl FS560 clearing saw and continuously thinning my ground, on the side. Grow them trees. (((o)))

bitternut

SwampDonkey, sawtooth oak are supposed to be in the red oak family and require 2 years for the acorns to reach maturity. They seem to carry over till spring and then just kind of dry up and fall off as summer approaches.

The seedlings came from a nursery in Clearfield Pa. but I am not sure where the seed source was. I thought that frost might be the problem but I am having the same situation with the couple of trees that I have growing in my yard at home. The trees are within 150' of Lake Ontario and peaches and nectarines grow fine here so frost can't be causing it. The dendrology department at Virginia Tech has some good pictures of the trees. The acorn picture they have looks just like the acorns on my trees. Here is a link http://www.cnr.vt.edu/dendro/dendrology/syllabus/qacutissima.htm

I haven't found any one that has any first hand experience raising a good crop of acorns from them yet. All the county extension services in our area have been selling them for several years so one of these days one of us should get lucky and get a good crop of acorns.

SwampDonkey

Bitternut:

Looks like there is an insufficient pollen source for pollenation. And keep in mind these trees are not mature either, which causes fertility problems. Do you see many pollen flowers like in this link?

QuoteTom: et al.

Here are some galls on my red oak rubra, seem to be in the pollen buds, also seen some in the emerging leaves.





cheers

Ignore the galls on the flowers. ;)
"No amount of belief makes something a fact." James Randi

1 Thessalonians 5:21

2020 Polaris Ranger 570 to forward firewood, Husqvarna 555 XT Pro, Stihl FS560 clearing saw and continuously thinning my ground, on the side. Grow them trees. (((o)))

bitternut

SwampDonkey, I do get the pollen flowers on all the trees but I don't think they are quite as abundant like your picture shows. Are those sawtooth oak flowers? I have quite a few red oak planted near by that also bore flowers the last couple of springs but no acorns yet for them either. My trees are planted in rows that are 8' apart and 6' to 8' apart in the row so they should be plenty close enough for pollination. I have one red oak in my yard that I planted from an acorn nine or ten years ago. It is over 20' tall now, almost 4'' dbh, straight as an arrow with a narrow crown. It has had flowers for at least the last three springs but no nuts yet. It had its first robins nest this summer. Guess they like that tree as much as I do. Oaks must produce flowers a few years before they begin to bear acorns.

SwampDonkey

The flowers are of red oak in that post, but they all look very similar for any oak. This tree I took the picture of was a tree I planted from an acorn in 1986 and it is similar to your own. It has had acorns and flowers for the last 7 or 8 years, if I remember correctly. I saw male flowers on my white oak this year, but no acorns. It was planted in 1988 I think, but is half the tree the red oak is. It doesn't grow near as fast.

Be patient with your oaks as they mature. Sometimes an acorn will grow even if  the ovary is not fertile. You open it up and there is nothing.
"No amount of belief makes something a fact." James Randi

1 Thessalonians 5:21

2020 Polaris Ranger 570 to forward firewood, Husqvarna 555 XT Pro, Stihl FS560 clearing saw and continuously thinning my ground, on the side. Grow them trees. (((o)))

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