White Oak: NC Tree of the Year

During a recent Arbor Day event, North Carolina Governor Josh Stein announced that the 2025 NC Tree of the Year is the White Oak, Quercus alba. White Oak is a great choice for a number of reasons. Its native to NC, fairly easy to grow, free of any significant insect or disease pests, and likely to play a big role in the reforestation efforts in western NC following last year’s Hurricane Helene devastation.

What about locally? White Oak is also happy in our Eastern North Carolina soils and climate, and makes a fantastic shade tree. At a mature height of about 80 feet tall and 50 to 60 feet wide, it is not a tree that is easy to fit in every backyard, but it is often used in parks and public spaces to provide shade for visitors. One of many species of oak found in NC, Quercus alba is notable for a few reasons. It has finger-like lobes that lack the sharp bristle at the tip of many other species. Leaf color is a pale green that is not quite as dark or glossy as other oak species. Compare their leaves to a red-oak type such as Quercus falcata or Quercus palustris, and you’ll probably come to the conclusion that White Oak has a softer, gentler appearance.

Above: The finger-like leaves of the White Oak. Leaf color is a pale green. Photo: W. Cutler, CC BY 2.0 Above right:
A mature White Oak. White Oaks can grow to 80 feet tall and 60 feet wide. Photo: J. Robbins, CC BY-NC-ND 4.0 Lower right: Leaves in late fall turn a burgundy red or coppery orange color, as seen here. Photo: C. Dewitt, CC BY 4.0

In the fall, these green leaves turn a burgundy red or coppery orange color, providing excellent fall color throughout several weeks in autumn. And then, something unusual happens, and this is the part of the column where you learn some fun new horticultural terms to impress your friends at parties. Instead of falling to the ground, a large portion of the leaves stay attached to the tree, turning brown and persisting throughout much of the winter. Why does this happen, you may wonder? Deciduous trees typically form a cluster of cells at the spot where a leaf’s petiole (a short stalk-like structure at the base of a leaf) attaches to a branch. Botanists refer to this as the abscission layer. As this area swells in autumn, it eventually reaches a literal breaking point where the petiole snaps off the branch and the leaf falls to the ground. Certain species of oak, beech, and ironwood often don’t fully develop this abscission layer, and thus dead leaves remain on the tree during the winter. Retention of dead leaves during the winter is referred to as marcescence. These marcescent leaves will gradually fall off one by one over the winter months due to rain, wind, snow, and other elements, and any that remain in the following spring are pushed off by the emerging new foliage.

Beyond this bit of botanical curiosity, oaks are an important food source for a number of wildlife species. We may not want to attract all of these to our home landscape, but deer, squirrels, and many other small mammals feed on acorns, and a number of songbirds, butterflies, and moths also feed on foliage and other plant parts. Acorns are even edible to humans, once the tannins are leached or boiled out. I will always recall fondly a long conversation I had early in my career with a local naturalist in Halifax County, who had determined after much experimentation that White Oak was the best species to make acorn coffee from. I decided to simply take his word for it, rather than experiment myself.

Matthew Stevens is the County Extension Director and Horticulture Agent for North Carolina Cooperative Extension’s Pitt County Center. If you have questions about this article or gardening in general, please contact the Pitt County Extension Master Gardeners at [email protected] or 252-902-1705.