FORESTRY ON THE COUNTRY ESTATE 



451 



gray squirrel is in reasonable abun- 

 dance, that is, has not been shot out, 

 the white oak will manage even as 

 far north as southern Elaine, since 

 the squirrel plants many an acorn 

 which otherwise would get eaten if left 

 on the forest floor over winter. In all 

 the southerly part of its range where 

 the fall comes late and mild winter 

 keeps up until December, the white oak 

 acorns sprout and make quite a growth 

 during the Indian Summer days, and 

 when it is time for its leaves to turn 



tree, reaching twelve inches in diameter 

 before its fiftieth year, but in many lo- 

 calities it occurs much less frequently 

 and should be reinforced by nursery 

 specimens at salient points, the cost be- 

 ing about $1.2") per 7-foot tree. If 

 many are wanted it will pay to run a 

 seed bed of them, transplanting the first 

 year. It is a strikingly handsome tree, 

 both as to bark and foliage, and its 

 color phases are always pleasing. Along 

 about the first of May appear the pretty 

 pink leaf buds, and early in June out 



Fig. 55-— Burr 0«k. (Q. macrocirpa, Michx.) 



copper and purple and finally a light 

 yellow brown hanging on all winter, the 

 little seedling has four leaves to show, 

 all of which go through the same 

 changes as the parent tree. In its light 

 requirements the white oak is fairly 

 tolerant at first, but by the tenth year it 

 must have sun for at least part of the 

 time, and after that it must not be over- 

 topped or it will languish. It does not 

 stand transplanting at all from one site 

 in the forest to another, except during 

 its first year, and a nursery specimen, 

 well root-pruned, must be taken when it 

 is 6 to T feet high if it is expected to 

 live in its new place. 



In the writer's forest Nature has 

 been exceedingly generous with her 

 white oaks, and it is our predominating 



Fig. 59.— Black Jack. (Q. nigra, L.J 



come the sap-green catkins which are 

 its flowers. These turn brown in time 

 and drop ofif and we have a tiny green 

 acorn in being. By September these 

 are in big clusters of large green acorns 

 which turn light yellow and then brown 

 as they fall to the forest floor. Mean- 

 while the leaves have turned wonderful 

 shades of pale copper and purple about 

 the middle of October, changing to rus- 

 set brown in November. This passes to 

 a pale vellow-brown during the winter 

 for the leaves hang on all through the 

 snow season, that is a large part of 

 them do, enough to give a fine note of 

 color on a winter landscape, and they 

 are finally pushed oft' by the oncoming 

 spring buds. Such is the year's calen- 

 dar for the white oak, always a favorite, 



