An acorn shortage endangers the Tennessee white oaks
Worker shortages prevent seed collection
As if COVID-19 wasn’t enough of a gut-punch, the disease has finally hit the trees.
A little known side effect of the virus is what it has done to the forests of Tennessee. Vendors responsible for gathering acorns were hit hard with job losses during the pandemic.
“They suddenly didn’t have enough workers to collect and sort the seeds,” said Gina Sowders, Tennessee’s Division of Forestry’s Reforestation Unit Leader. “We’ve been seeing declines in oaks and hickories.”
When she says “oaks,” she means specifically the majestic white oaks that can grow to be 100-feet tall. They offer shade for anything that resides beneath them. They attract tourists who admire their changing leaves in the fall. They provide food for animals and, during rainy seasons, erosion control.
And now they are in trouble.
“Those are the giant, dominant trees of the forest,” Sowders said.
Sowders has been interested in the forest since taking hikes with her father when she was a little girl. She’s worried about the white oaks.
The collected yield of white oak acorns is down in 2021 by 2,300 pounds. One pound of acorns can give birth to 50 white oaks.
Adding to the collector shortage, there was so much rain in Tennessee this year that more acorns on the ground rotted. Sometimes, even the well-intentioned people trying to help aren’t effective, like the time Sowders put out a tarp to collect acorns and deer and squirrels ate her catch “like a buffet” before she could gather them up.
Several groups are working together, including the White Oak Initiative, the University of Tennessee in Knoxville and Vanderbilt University, to save the trees.
As the White Oaks die off, if they are not replanted, their space is taken by smaller trees like maple, sassafras and beech or opportunistic, invasive plants like privets or kudzu.
Once White Oaks give up their territory to intruders, “we lose that site,” Sowders said.
Hoping to find more acorns, Sowders turned to Vanderbilt, where James Moore is the landscape architect. His father is the noted Nashville songwriter Hunter Moore, who has written songs performed by Alabama, Kathy Mattea and Ricky Scaggs.
“We have a need for seeds,” Moore said.
Moore offered to collect acorns from 50 majestic white oaks on Vanderbilt’s campus, most of them just outside the Peabody Library and Esplanade. In all, Vanderbilt has 6,000 trees on its 300plus-acre campus (including the medical center).
Moore tapped a few alumni for help. They spread tarps on the ground to catch the falling acorns.
The squirrels didn’t take too many. “Our squirrels are pretty well-fed already,” Moore said.
This year’s effort netted about 50,000 viable acorns, Moore said.
It also sparked what he hopes becomes a movement.
“It’s something we’re excited to repeat next year,” Moore said.
Moore and Sowders said they plan to launch an acorn collecting movement across Tennessee. They’ll ask students and volunteers to tuck away acorns they find.
The most prolific acorn dropping season for the white oaks is between October 15 and November 15. Collected acorns are sent to the state’s East Tennessee nursery, where they will be checked and planted. Then they will be sold or provided to agencies across the state in about a year.
Those agencies will plant white oaks in cities, parks and forests in Tennessee.
For information about getting involved in collection, go to the White Oak Initiative’s website, or call 615-8833832
Reach Keith Sharon at 615-406-1594 or ksharon@tennessean.com or on Twitter @Keithsharontn.