I have seen the pin oak aka Quercus palustris several times because it’s a very common landscaping tree, but I’ve never seen it wild because it’s actually very rare in the wild of NC. Apparently. I didn’t even know that! I thought he was common here and it took me a while to realize the only time I would see them were when they were planted. I just never thought about it even as I got obsessed with oaks until I looked it up a week or two ago and NEVERMIND Its barely here! From what I’ve researched online it exists in the wild in like the upper part of the piedmont in NC. Anyone up there know a spot where they observed it? In north Carolina all the observations are obscured so I can’t see any particular place. The fact that they’re obscured makes me worried this is something I shouldn’t be asking about but anyways. How can it be so common as a landscaping plant here but it hasn’t escaped into the wild the sawtooth oak could do it and he’s from Asia. Do the people who take care of them just stop every acorn ever from spreading? Anyways sorry for ranting I know there’s not a great chance you guys know this but anyone who has been to that area or just anywhere else where it naturalized tell me please i WILL drive max two hours from Cary park. Maybe a bit more.
Welcome to the forum. @phma might be a good resource for this, as I believe he is in North Carolina, and he definitely has discussed trees in the context of his work.
Welcome to the forum! Those of us who are active on the forum are just a tiny minority of iNaturalist users. For questions like this, I like to see what the entire iNat database has to say.
So, here’s a link for the map view of 390 observations of this species in North Carolina that are marked wild and verifiable. https://www.inaturalist.org/observations?captive=false&place_id=30&subview=map&taxon_id=54785
They may not all really be wild, of course. And glancing at that map, it looks like a bunch of observation locations are obscured. But this at least gives you a good overview.
@larry216 ‘s answer is superb and I am hopeful he or someone else who can explain better than I will also address this, because as far as I know you need not be concerned you are doing anything wrong by asking about any particular taxon.
Hello, Larry. One thing I’m not sure I explained correctly is that every single pin oak in North Carolina is obscured and you can’t make the location open. I actually just tried it myself to make sure and when I set the location to open and then logged out of my account to see if a regular user would be able to view the location, it was obscured. The pin oaks available in the database from what I’ve see are just a leaf or an acorn which makes it impossible to tell if it’s casual or wild unless it’s like in the middle of a city with no wild trees for miles, cultivated and listed as wild, misidentifications, and there are of course actual wild observations although it is usually very hard to determine the specifics when it comes to the environment it finds itself when looking at the photos people uploaded, such as the difference between the middle of a park and the middle of a marsh, because the location is always obscured so it’s hard to fully tell if an observation is actually wild. But nevertheless the ones that do from the photo exist in the wild, are obscured. The large range of the obscuring makes it very difficult for someone to find a pin oak. For example right now I’m looking at an observation that from the photo is in fact in a marshy area, somewhere in the entirety of charlotte, and despite my love for oak trees and my determination, I am not willing to scan the entirety of charlotte looking for that particular area that likely has more than one pin oak. Any given location has a very small amount of the ones that exist in the wild proven by the photo, so currently my best bet would be to find the many kilometres wide square with the most observations that actually appear wild. And that would take quite a long time. I plan on going to the piedmont anyways sometime in spring, as that location is verified by many different sources to contain native pin oak trees. My inquiry was to possibly see if anyone could recommend a more specific location than the northern piedmont so I don’t drive up there and find myself in an area with limited pin oaks. Which is why my question was such a longshot. Anyways sorry for ranting again and pardon me if my tone in this comes off weird
My first observation of an oak was a post oak, so called on the deed, but all I could tell by looking at it was that it has typical oak leaves. I’m not an expert at identifying oaks (the two different oaks across the street from each other just looked like oak to me), and I have several unidentified observations of oaks.
It’s not a problem that you’re asking. Sorry, I didn’t read your opening post closely enough or examine that map closely enough before posting my reply. Any observer can obscure any of their observations (like if it’s from their own home and they don’t want to share that information with the internet) but in this case it is a blanket policy to protect sensitive species. According to the status tab for Quercus palustris, North Carolina is the only place where that’s in effect.
Conservation Status: Watch List: believed to be rare and of conservation concern in the state but not warranting active monitoring at this time.
As for the size of the obscuration box, that’s explained in the article What is geoprivacy? What does it mean for an observation to be obscured? Unfortunately, that 0.2 x 0.2 degree cell does make it difficult to use that observation data to actually find it in the field. But that is the point, in these cases.
The most likely explanation is that the climate in most of NC is suitable for growing pin oak bought from nurseries, but too dry or too warm at the wrong time of year for the seeds to survive, stratify, and germinate in the wild, or for the seedlings to make it through their fragile first weeks of life. For example, if the seeds routinely try to sprout during a winter warm up, only to get killed by another freeze, while in colder regions they would have waited until spring. Or if they drop too early in the fall, and dry out before stratification can even begin.
As far as finding one to see in the wild, if there’s a university extension in the piedmont area, you might try reaching out to them before your trip. Maybe there’s a locally well-known place they could point you to.
I figured that was the case. I’d only ever seen that blanket policy be used on endangered or rare oak trees. I might as well just go to any other state to be honest if I want any specific forest/trail/preserve I could find it in :)
That explanation makes a lot of sense! Also thats good advice on reaching out to a university extension before!
NC is unusually “aggressive” in their geoprivacy settings and routinely obscures any species with a status, even those that clearly don’t meet iNat’s guidelines for obscuring (taxa with threat from poaching/collection/disturbance). Looking in another state is probably the best answer in this situation.
I unobscured locations in NC last night because none of the conservation status notes from the North Carolina Natural Heritage Program mentioned poaching/trampling/etc as a threat, and it’s hard for me to imagine that a plant already so widely available in cultivation would be threatened by having its geoprivacy made public. That said, any user is welcome to flag the taxon if they disagree and think that this taxon should still have obscured geoprivacy in NC or elsewhere.
It appears that the vast majority of NC observations are indeed cultivated plants, though a few look to be truly wild. @wagawaga83 you might enjoy reviewing the observations and marking “not wild” in the DQA for those plants that are clearly cultivated (having location pins should help with this!). In the process, you’ll find some sites to visit to see wild plants. Trying to see all the native oaks in your area is a worthy goal; they are magnificent trees! I once drove an hour to see Schuette’s oak myself, and it was time well spent. :)
oh my how I just came here because I saw they were unobscured and I was gonna say what a huge coincidence but holy shit man thank you!! I am going to in fact go review them that was impossible for most of em because people frequently upload one photo of a branch or leaf and I had no idea if it was like in the middle of a park or something!! And then I can go finish my native to NC collection!!! After the swamp white oak which is in a path by nc state from the observations they look mostly wild in just regular forest. Again thank you. Oh and the Schuettes oak is in fact a pretty cool guy haven’t seen him yet due to lack of time up north though