Later dropping Red Oak

b116757

5 year old buck +
85B5F800-46A6-4D80-8C85-77A26EAA2E51.jpegI think this tree maybe Shumard Oak I can’t say for sure but it is an annually heavy producer of large acorns that drop in December. They haven’t really started dropping yet as of today.
 

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Nice
 
Very cool. I wonder about the interest from deer. The reds get consumed later as the tannic acid is deteriorating; does this start happening on the tree or not until the acorns hit the ground? I guess you’ll have to taste one when they start dropping and let us know


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I have a lot of oaks behind my house we where back there today. I have two red oaks about 60’ apart one I think is Shumard one I think is NRO the leaves on the ground around one of them where all torn up the deer must be hanging around under that tree waiting for the acorns to drop the other one had very little sign underneath it now it is possible the one tree hadn’t started dropping at all yet. They both still had a pretty good acorn crop in their crowns. All of my Chinkapin acorns are long gone and it was a very good year for them. They definitely are already eating red oak acorns at least at my place. They mill around my place all fall picking acorns to eat it’s one of the reasons I opted to plant so many oaks out at the farm.
 
On my hunting property, there are only NRO and the deer hit them as soon as the acorns hit the ground. They stop under the trees along the field and rout around before going out into the bean leftovers.
 
I planted shumard, nuttall and a NRO / Shumard cross in hopes to get some later drop times. I'm only a couple years in, but the shumards and nuttalls aren't doing very well. Lots of winter die off of the branches. The hybrids are doing great and seem to be more shade tolerant for planting in openings.
 
Several years back, a friend sent scions of 'Macon' Q.nuttalli (I think it's actually been shown to be a Nuttall X Pin oak hybrid)... and photos of it with a significant portion of its acorn crop still hanging on March 14.
I've grafted it onto Northern Red, Southern Red and Pin oak understock; seems to like Q.rubra & Q.falcata better than Q.palustris.
1638885901745.jpeg
 
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