Black oak (Quercus velutina): what the agencies record

This page reports what US federal publications say about one tree. It does not identify trees from descriptions or photos and does not say what should be done with any tree. The family overview, tree species in the agency records, explains the sources and holds the comparison table.

At a glance

Item	What the source records
Scientific name	Quercus velutina Lam., beech family
Other names	Yellow oak, quercitron, yellowbark oak and smoothbark oak (Silvics)
Native status, USDA PLANTS	Native in Canada and in the lower 48 states
Mature size, Silvics	Most mature trees are 18 to 24 m (60 to 80 ft) tall and 61 to 91 cm (24 to 36 in) in diameter; on the best sites up to 46 m (150 ft) and 122 cm (48 in)
Lifespan, Silvics	Physiologically mature at about 100 years, some individuals living 150 to 200 years
Green weight of the wood, NRS-38	64 lb per cubic foot, without bark

Native range and sites

The Silvics of North America handbook (Agriculture Handbook 654, volume 2, 1990) calls black oak a common, medium-sized to large oak of the eastern and midwestern United States. It records a wide range from southwestern Maine west through New York to extreme southern Ontario, southeastern Minnesota and Iowa, south through eastern Nebraska, eastern Kansas, central Oklahoma and eastern Texas, and east to northwestern Florida and Georgia. The handbook says it grows best on moist, rich, well-drained soils but is often found on poor, dry, sandy or heavy glacial clay hillsides, where it seldom lives more than 200 years. It adds that black oak is seldom used for landscaping and not extensively planted as an ornamental, though its fall colour contributes greatly to the look of oak forests.

Flowers and acorns

Silvics describes black oak as monoecious. Male catkins emerge before or with the current leaves in April or May, and female flowers sit in the leaf axils of the current year's growth. The acorn grows singly or in clusters of two to five, is about one-third enclosed in a scaly cup, and takes two growing seasons to mature, ripening from late August to late October depending on location. The handbook says good acorn crops feed squirrels, white-tailed deer, mice, voles, turkeys and other birds, and that fox squirrels have been seen feeding on the catkins in Illinois.

Growth

The handbook gives average diameter growth in the Central States of about 5 mm (0.2 in) a year over 10 years. In West Virginia, it says dominant black oaks grew faster in diameter than scarlet, chestnut and white oaks but slower than northern red oak. For the root system it states that no information is available.

Wood

Silvics says the wood, commercially valuable for furniture and flooring, is sold as red oak. The Wood Handbook (FPL-GTR-282, 2021) lists black oak in the red oak group of the Eastern states, which it describes as having nearly white sapwood 2 to 5 cm (1 to 2 in) wide and brown heartwood with a tinge of red, and says lumber of the group cannot be separated by species on wood characteristics alone.

Wood Handbook Table 5-3b	Specific gravity	Modulus of rupture (lbf per square inch)	Side hardness (lbf)
Green	0.56	8,200	1,060
At 12% moisture content	0.61	13,900	1,210

The Wood Handbook states that specific gravity is based on oven-dry weight and the volume when green or at 12% moisture content. The green weight of the wood without bark is in the NRS-38 table, the same figure used in the log weight calculator.

Pests and diseases the handbook names

Silvics (1990) names these agents by the names it used.

Wildfire. The handbook says fire seriously damages black oak by killing cambial tissue at the base of the trunk, which creates an entry point for decay fungi and heart rot. Trees up to pole size are easily killed, and many killed trees sprout.
Oak wilt. Ceratocystis fagacearum, called a potentially serious vascular disease of black oak, widespread in the eastern United States. The handbook says trees die within a few weeks after symptoms first appear, and the disease spreads between trees through root grafts and over larger distances by sap-feeding beetles and the small oak bark beetle. What agencies say about the disease is in the guides on oak wilt and oak wilt by state and province.
Root rots and cankers. Armillaria mellea, which it says may kill trees weakened by fire, lightning, drought, insects or other diseases; Phytophthora cinnamomi, which may kill nursery seedlings; and Strumella and Nectria cankers that damage trunks but seldom kill trees.
Foliage diseases. The same ones that typically attack the red oak group: anthracnose, leaf blister, powdery mildews, oak-pine rusts and leaf spots.
Borers. Carpenterworm, red oak borer, twolined chestnut borer, oak timberworm and Columbian timber beetle, which the handbook says cause serious lumber degrade.
Defoliators. The gypsy moth, called potentially the most destructive insect: black oaks withstood one defoliation, but two or three in successive years killed many trees in New Jersey. Variable oakleaf caterpillar, orangestriped oakworm and browntail moth are also named.
Acorn pests. Nut weevils, gall-forming cynipids, the filbertworm and the acorn moth.

The gypsy moth is the same insect as the spongy moth. The guide on spongy moth rules by country sets out what each agency says, and reporting a pest in the United States gives the office that takes sightings of regulated pests. Who may apply pesticides is in pesticide licences by country.