Charlee

I have to look up "Garry Oaks" had never heard of them! :)


I checked on White oaks....found this from a government site:

Seed Production and Dissemination- White oak can produce seeds prolifically, but good acorn crops are irregular and occur only every 4 to 10 years. Sometimes several years may pass without a crop. Acorn yields range from 0 to 500,000 acorns per hectare (202,000/acre) (7,22,28). This great variation in acorn production exists not only among isolated stands of oaks but also among individual trees within stands and from year to year.

Trees normally bear seeds between the ages of 50 and 200 years, sometimes older; however, opengrown trees may produce seeds as early as 20 years. Individual white oak trees tend to have either very good or very poor seed crops and are noticeably consistent in seed production from year to year (20,28,36,40). A recent study (13) showed that white oak flower production varies not only annually but also among trees within a given year and that much of the variation in acorn production can be related to flower abundance at the time of pollination. More than 23,000 acorns were produced during a good seed year by an individual white oak tree growing in Virginia; it was 69 years old, 63.5 cm (25 in) in d.b.h., and 21 in (69 ft) tall, and had a crown area of 145 m² (1,560 ft²) . Average production in good years for individual forest-grown trees, however, is probably no more than 10,000 acorns.

Several studies have shown that only a small portion of the total mature acorn crop (sometimes only 18 percent) is sound and fully developed; the remainder is damaged or destroyed by animals and insects (15,28,40). However, some damaged acorns germinate if the embryo is not damaged. Light acorn crops are often completely destroyed by animals and insects, so seedlings are produced only during heavy crop years.