Oldest oak we've ever cut up.(updated counted ring

Cut some fire wood today. Not the biggest oak we have ever cut up but might be the oldest. Top broke off 2 years ago. It was the smallest oak in a group of 4 trees. Some of the tightest rings as well. It's a red oak.

It was 19 inch diameter

Some excellent firewood. What would you estimate the age to be?

160 years old

I counted rings on a Garryana oak in western Oregon that was 280 years old.

That's a beauty dakids

It is almost a shame to cut that into firewood. Then again, what do you do with a bunch of Oak 1x12's?

The big oak in the back of the lumber piles is actually two can't see the other one behind the first. They are the oldest on my property about 30inches across at waist high. I am guessing around 250 years old. I am tempted to buy an increment borer and find out.

It's amazing how much $ oak saw logs are worth. I thought I had a bunch on my property, but a lot of it had too many cracks/holes in it that were't noticed until the logger cut the tree down.

Many years ago I had "Oneeyedtrapper" saw some Red Oak for me. Beautiful stuff! I strip piled it in the pole barn for a few years and tried to sell it. No one was interested. I had someone plane it on 4 sides and tried to sell it for a few more years. I finally put it on an auction and it brought less than what I paid to have it sawn, let alone planed.

I used to own some bottom land that was 60% covered in Garryana oak. I had the logging records from a thinning done 80 years before and the stumps were still rock solid.

Around here there's a market w/ the amish.

Aje I haven't cut any oak in 15 years on my property because it is not worth any money here in ontario so I keep growing them for the grandchildren. Only have about 40 mature ones but about 400 in the 5 to 12 inch diameter class. It is a bit of an obsession for me to grow as many as I can on this property in my life. Always tending and pruning in the summer months.

Agreed
Growing/improving oaks is fun. We don't prune in the summer due to wilt.

I thought this would show a better picture of the oak but only a cast iron pot.

I don't prune the oaks themselves until late October but do a lot of brushing around them and some white pine I have been able to establish over the last 20 years. I have about 25 acres of suger maple I'm going to try to do an understory thinning in this summer if I can find a few helpers. It is a big job. I have removed all of the large logs and firewood in that area and only have 15 inch dbh and down but the regeneration is too thick and needs to be thined and spaced for it to really take off and thrive. I have been working on a area of yellow birch for the last couple of years.

I'll have White Oak sawn occasionally for lumber.
When I have mine sawn up I have whats locally called by knowledgeable saw operators as Ray sawn.
Most saw operators don't know or most likely don't want to saw a log this way.
You get alot more waste but you get the best boards both from a stability and appearance stand point.



Every cut thru the log leaves one side of the board with a cut that is perpendicular to the growth rings. Or if the log was whole it would go straight thru the pith.
So you get 2 boards then you have to move (usually Rotating) the log and saw 2 more then rotate again and so on.
As you cut the log up you get smaller and smaller wedges till in the end you end up with small wedge pieces that are scrap.
You'll find that wood workers will call it quarter sawn but if you go to most saw operators and ask for a log to be quarter sawn you will get very few of these highly figured desirable boards.

DirtyD I think ray sawn and quarter sawn are a bit different in the way they are sawn. I might be mistaken but I'm not sure?

yes, they are different

Your ground is a blessing . What little I have is plagued with spruce bud worm and pine beetle . plus a horde of deer ! I give thanks for the place daily ! Went to the government land today and cut some 17 ft corral poles .Good straight lodgepole pine . Thank the good Lord for that !

Wow

A couple of pictures of the old oak from a different place.



And some of the areas I need to thin.

One of the places that I cut firewood on has registered trees that are some of the oldest in the state. I few years ago we cut up a branch that feel off in a storm. That one branch was over 20 inches across.

Was a time I was called to haul away a 6 foot diameter bur oak. As there was a fellow studing the growth rings , I dropped off a cross section of it.
It was on Winchester Street in Winnipeg which was opposite to the air field where in WW1 they had trenches for rifle practice and there was photos for the pilots to read. There was a house with a wee house with a cresent moon in the photo. Water and sewar was put in that area in 1960 and the tree was cut in 1990. The last 30 years the rings were decreasing because of the lack of night watering. Up to 1880 -1890 they use to run a passenger pigeon trap under that tree. It was only living from 1830 to 1990. Unfortunatel that tree could not be used for climate change because of the feeding it got. There was about 30 rounds found in the wood that I split...who knows what came out of the ashes of the firewood sold.

I got 10 years of firewood out of a Burr Oak that was 63" dia ABH.

You should probably be executed! Get that milled!

If it were white oak I'd agree with you, red oak, not so much.

I wonder what stunted its growth?

Fighting for light/dealing with a tall canopy and/or living on a north facing slope most of it's life would be my guess.

Some of the nicest timber I ever cut was on northern facing exposures. Southern facing always seemed smaller. Possibly soil conditions? Another thought is there couldnt have been bigger trees crowding it the whole 160 years? The ring spacing looks all the same from what I see in the picture.

What a difference your climate has on trees . A red oak in my area that same size would likely be less than 50 years old . I’ve cut red oak that was over three foot across and they were only a handful that made 120 years. They usually just don’t live that long in this area.

I sanded, got the wood wet to easier count the rings and used an app as well. Tree sprouted in 1782. 241 years old.

The fellow that was doing the collecting here in Manitoba was doing 10 year intervals of the growth, burr oak does show some related dry-wet conditions in it's rings. Through different sections of wood from settlers buildings, washed up logs and some found stumps with the glacial rebound of Lake Winnipeg. Dates from 0360AD to 1980. Eric Nelson or Nelsen the danish way of spelling

many times the silk worms would completely devoid the trees so many false rings have to be looked at. There is a silk worm that comes out and feeds in late July on the burr oaks here. It is not as bright and beautiful as the Luna or Polythemus

That is really cool. Imagine the things that tree could tell you if it could see its surroundings and talk about what happened around it over the course of 2 1/2 centuries. Very cool.

I was thinking the same thing.

That tree is a lot older than I expected. I agree with sweetWilliam on the valve of red oak currently.

Remember that Burr oak when it goes overseas is classified as " English brown oak" and you thought red oak was of value.
when they can ship it air express that means big $$$$ to get it to market

Probably the 4 bigger oaks on all sides

Around here they were harvested for fence post 4-8 inches and when over that left for firewood
What saved the cutting of oak post was the treating process developed in the 1960.