Hows your fall mast looking?

[shaman]

I have heard that oak trees periodically have extremely bad years, sometimes for no apparent reason.  Last season, we had a poor acorn crop as well.  I'm about 10 miles from Ohio, close up to the river.  The acorn crop was lousy.  This year is a banner year for both the reds and the whites.

It is believed that oak trees have a 10 year cycle.  You'll see good and bad through that cycle, but every decade or so, the acorns will nearly fail completely and the squirrel population crashes.  The next year, the acorns are abundant, and there is nothing left to eat them and the acorns are left to sprout new trees. This may be a evolutionary thing that allows the oaks to manage the squirrels, and better allow the oaks to reproduce.

Remember too that the red oaks have a regular cycle where the acorns only drop every two years.  White oaks, the ones with lobed leaves, drop every year.