Bursting with scarlet and maroon hues, northern red oaks provide fall’s second act

Maple trees tend to take center stage for fall accolades. It’s hard not to fawn over them when they’re among the first trees to change color, in shades bright enough to seem illuminated.

Think of fall, though, like watching a sunset. While many people know to gather for the day’s golden hour and look to the west, there’s often more to come after the sun dips below the horizon. The colors darken and deepen in new hues on the way to darkness.

Consider oaks — especially the northern red oak — Minnesota’s second act for leaf-peeping. After sumac and maples retire their fiery reds, oaks add scarlet, maroon and mahogany to the landscape.

Northern red oaks are among Minnesota’s six native oaks, including swamp oak, white oak, burr oak, northern pin oak and black oak.

It can take northern red oaks at least two decades to produce acorns, which can take two years to mature. They produce the most classic-looking acorns, with domed tops and smooth shallow cups that resemble upside-down berets.

Acorns produced by the state’s oaks provide a major source of nutrition for many of Minnesota’s animals. Everyone has seen squirrels and chipmunks feed on them. Rabbits, turkeys, whitetail deer, black bear, woodchucks, mallards, raccoons, grouse, foxes, and a variety of smaller birds will also eat acorns. Turkeys also may be spotted roosting in sturdy oak branches at night.

Birds and mammals build nests in oak branches, stash seeds into crevices of the bark, and hunt insects, spiders and larvae that might be hiding there.

“That’s a plus and a minus,” said Paul Kortebein, forester with Three Rivers Park District. They can communicate through the roots and through chemical signals to warn other trees of threats, but those connections also make it easier for diseases like oak wilt to spread.

The leaves of red oaks, which include black oak and northern pin oak, can be distinguished from white oaks by their pointed tips. While distillers covet white oak to make barrels for aging liquor, red oak is deemed too porous for making barrels.

Minnesota’s oak and aspen forests can be seen in the Twin Cities at Murphy-Hanrehan Park Reserve, Hyland Lake Park Preserve, Lebanon Hills Regional Park and Spring Lake Park, and throughout state parks such as Afton, Nerstrand Big Woods, Whitewater and others in the Big Woods ecosystem.