…about oaks
ONE: there are two native oaks in the UK: the pedunculate oak (Quercus robur), sometimes called the English oak, and the sessile oak (Quercus petraea). They are easily told apart: pedunculate oaks bear their acorns on a stem (a peduncle) while sessile oak acorns have no stem.
TWO: fossil oaks have been found that date back to the Middle Eocene, which means that the genus is somewhere between 40 and 50 million years old.
THREE: the oldest oak in the UK is the Bowthorpe Oak, near Bourne in Lincolnshire, which is believed to be over 1,000 years old.
FOUR: worldwide, there are about 500 species of oak, both deciduous and evergreen.
FIVE: oaks are keystone species: they have a disproportionately important effect on the ecosystems that house them.
SIX: the fruit of the oak is, technically speaking, a nut – but we call it an acorn. Acorns develop in cups known as cupules, and each contains a single seed .
SEVEN: squirrels, mice and voles, deer, rats and badgers are among the British mammals that eat acorns.
EIGHT: in Britain, we know of 2,300 species of animals, plants and fungi that are supported by oaks. Of those, 326 depend entirely on oak for survival, and 229 species are rarely found on any tree other than an oak.
NINE: there are around 70 different species of oak gall wasps resident in Britain.
TEN: globally, nearly a third of oak species are threatened with extinction. The culprits are familiar enemies: climate change, invasive pests, and habitat loss.
Header image : The Lone Oak by Simon Knight
Southwick Country Park Nature Reserve 