Oaks - It's Always Much More Complicated

I spent most of the 3nd week of September in North Florida, on a tract of land bordered by the Suwannee River. Though I have known this place for 40-some years, I never had looked really hard at the plants - apart from a few wildflowers.

It take far more focus and memory than I possess to see something thoroughly without drawing it. On this visit I decided I would try to figure out what some of the hardwoods are. I'm weak in hardwoods when it comes to my own neck of the woods, so this was a real challenge, especially when it came to oaks.

The German philosopher Ludwig Marcuse kept the framed motto "Es ist immer alles viel komplizierter" (It is always much more complicated) above his desk. It is a good motto for the amateur botanist - and it certainly proved true when it came to my identifying oaks.

I made  mistakes. An axiom the late botanist Robert Reed emphasized when he was teaching plant identification was, "Plants vary." I didn't follow his advice - didn't look at enough leaf samples from different parts of the tree, so what I had might or might not have been representative. I didn't label specimens, so later on I had no idea whether similar but slightly different leaves had come from the same plant. I didn't study the bark, and too late, I found out that bark can matter. I didn't study the habit and stature of the trees hard enough. The trees I was trying to id were growing in relatively crowded conditions. Still, I could have made useful observations about relative sizes and gotten some idea of the overall shape of the crown. I did not have a useful loupe. That's on my "to buy" list now, because I really needed one to study the undersides of the leaves.

I didn't get to all the oaks on the property - only 3 as a matter of fact. My ids are tentative. There were no acorns visible, and no flowers. Acorns, especially, would have helped a lot.

When I started sketching the trees  below I first thought it was just one tree. Soon enough I realized my mistake. Then I thought I had 2 oaks. Later I discovered that the smaller tree was an American elm.

Oak with American Elm
WC, Niji brushes, Aquabee Mixed Media 9x9, 93 lb

I'm used to drawing fine details, so trying for an entire tree was a real challenge, and I obviously need to get more practice, especially when it comes to getting the underlying structure. You can't just glob in a lot of green and hope a tree emerges. These trees were growing so close together it was very difficult to see which branches belonged to which trunk, but I was trying mainly for a general impression. The oak might be a live oak, Quercus virginiana. Though it doesn't show the massive horizontal branches typical of the species, the short, divided trunk  is typical of the species.

Who Am I?
same paper, ink, wc

This specimen, from the tree above, shows leaves of various shapes, but they more-or-less fit the profile for live oak. On the other hand, they are smooth on the underside, which rules out live oaks, which are quite hairy underneath. But perhaps I didn't look at enough leaves. The plant could be a Darlington oak, Quercus hemisphaerica. Then again, it could be something else. Nelson writes that Darlington oak sometimes is confused with the live oak. (p.209). I'll have to wait until I can get back to the site before I can go any farther.

Quercus nigra, Water Oak

I think I am on slightly firmer ground with what I am calling the water oak, Quercus nigra. The general shape of the leaf and the presence of fine hairs at the vein axils on the underside of the leaf argue for this identification.There is a slight problem, though. Gil Nelson doesn't mention any bristles on the leaf tips, but Richard Wunderlin includes it as a distinguishing characteristic. Guess what?

Water Oak? with Bristle-Tipped Leaves

Here's a specimen that clearly has bristles at the tips of some leaves. If I'd kept a record of which samples came from which trees, I'd have a much better case for arguing that both the drawing and the photo represent the same species. I think they probably do, but again, I won't know for sure until I can look again.

My final oak sums up my dilemma - total confusion. It has fine hairs in the vein axils like turkey oak and water oak, but it really doesn't look like any of the illustrations in my field guides. For now I am just calling it my "mystery oak."

Who Am I?

On top of everything else, oaks hybridize to some extent.  Marcuse was right. It's always much more complicated.


My references: Gil Nelson. The Trees of Florida. 2nd Edition. Pineapple Press. 2011. pp. 201-218.

Richard Wunderlin. Guide to the Vascular Plants of Florida. University Press of Florida. 1998. pp. 256-260.

Hermann Kurtz & Robert K. Godfrey. Trees of Northern Florida. University Press of Florida. 1962.