Sunday, June 19, 2011

White Oak Commission Revisited

Well, it's time to re-visit the oak leave/acorn commission in a slightly more "botanical" way.
Come to find out what Kendra wanted were WHITE OAK acorns. Good old Quercus Alba. Of course, why didn't you say so.

White oaks are 60-100 feet high, 2-3' in diameter..tall and straight in the forest, rounded in the open...with irregular and heavy limbs. (You don't want one of these babies falling on your roof!)

Bark is pale gray and scaly and the leaf is deeply lobed. Sometimes the leaves remain on the tree all winter.

The fruit is a light brown (green in spring) acorn maturing in the first year enclosed in a cap.

The white oak is common on better soils in the southern half of Wisconsin. It's wood is light brown and is good for heavy construction, railway ties, interior finish, furniture and fuel.
Forest Trees of Wisconsin, Department of Natural Resources Bureau of Forestry 1990


So...the issue of making these more botanical than previously posted has to do with more deeply lobed leaves AND the acorns are NOT on stems as previous drawn but rather close together on the twig near the leaf.

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