Oaks, Acorns and You
(Page 2 of 3)
NUT BOOM AND BUST
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Mast refers to fruits and seeds of trees and shrubs. Wildlife biologists distinguish two types of mast: hard and soft. Soft mast includes pine seeds and fruits from vines, shrubs and small trees—persimmon, dogwood, grape, blackberry, and the like. Soft mast is used by wildlife primarily during the summer and fall. Hard mast consists of nuts. This includes beech, hickory, walnut and others, but acorns are by far the bulk of the hard-mast crop. Some scientists say oaks produce more nuts annually than all other kinds of nut trees combined—both wild and commercial.
The hard-mast crop is hardly consistent, though, from year to year. Instead, it follows a boom-and-bust cycle. Bumper crops seldom occur back to back, and are typically succeeded by several years of average to poor production. Then, boom—another bumper.
The immediate effects of this fluctuating food supply are predictable. Following good mast years, animals are well-nourished, reproduction rates soar and wildlife populations increase. Poor years produce the opposite effect. Malnourished animals starve or die from disease, and breeding falls off.
SMART TREES
Scientists have barely begun to unravel the many ecological repercussions of the oak forest's wax-and-wane mast cycle. For that matter, they're not entirely sure why the nut crop varies as it does. Certainly weather and other environmental influences are a factor—a drought can sap trees of reproductive energy; a late spring frost can kill flowers. But weather doesn't appear to be the main influence. Bumper-crop years aren't always especially weather-blessed. Poor mast years occur even when conditions are ideal for acorn growth.
Many scientists now believe the mast cycle is an evolutionary adaptation; that over the eons oaks and other nut-bearing trees have developed an on-and-off mast cycle to ensure their reproductive survival. The theory makes sense. If oaks produced a consistently healthy crop of acorns every year, populations of nutloving animals would rise to the point where all the acorns would be eaten no matter how numerous. None would remain to grow into mighty oaks.
The mast cycle solves the problem. During moderate to poor years, wildlife get by as best they can, seldom increasing and often decreasing in numbers. Then comes a good year, when the trees pour it on and produce far more nuts than the animals can consume, no matter how fast they reproduce. Nuts are left to germinate and renew the forest. Over the leaner years following, wildlife again dwindles to numbers too few to eat all of the next bumper crop. And so the cycle continues: The trees in effect keep nut predators at bay, like mother hens protecting their eggs.
WHERE YOU COME IN
The roles oaks and their acorns play in nature are numerous and, to a large extent, not yet fully understood. Certainly, the dynamics of wildlife populations are impacted in countless ways. There's no question the annual acorn harvest is critical to countless creatures. So it makes sense to carefully manage oaks on your property.
