Pedunculate Oak
Quercus robur
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Acorns on long stalks, leaves on almost none — the mirror image of the sessile oak.
A massive, spreading deciduous tree of lowland soils, and the oak of parkland, hedgerow and field corner around Dumfries. Its acorns hang on long stalks — peduncles — while the leaves have very short stalks and two small ear-like lobes clasping the twig. Old individuals become enormously broad and hollow, and can live for many hundreds of years.
Behaviour
Oaks flush their leaves in a single burst in spring, and the caterpillars that eat them — chiefly winter moth — time their hatch to match it. That caterpillar peak is what blue tits, great tits and pied flycatchers feed their broods on, so the whole woodland breeding season pivots on it. Jays bury acorns and forget many of them, which is how oaks travel uphill.
When to see it
Quick facts
- Family
- Beeches and oaks (Fagaceae)
- Height
- Up to 40 m; can live 500 years or more
- Status
- Native; the oak of lowland soils and parkland
Photo by The, CC BY-SA 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons