The lowly acorn, or oak nut, what a marvel of nature

I was sitting out in the back yard with Bride today enjoying the beautiful day and I noticed an acorn sitting by my left foot. We have two big oak trees in our front yard and sometimes they bounce of the roof and make it to the back yard, where I found this little guy. As I sat there staring at the little umbrella shaped, or as learned after reading up a bit on it, the cupule I wondered how in the world did this thing evolve.

I did not know that the things only contained one seed, I learned that sometimes, but VERY rarely, they contain two seeds. Here is a lowly nut that could one day turn into the mighty oak tree, or into lunch or dinner for some squirrel. I also learned that it is not wise to eat acorns as they are found on the ground. Raw acorns contain high concentrations of tannic acid making them taste is bitter, and some varieties can be toxic to humans. The tannins can be removed, the native American Indians shelled nuts into a bag and let the bag sit in the waters of a fast running stream. Boiling the nuts repeatedly, until the water no longer contains any trace of the brown tannic acid, accomplishes the task as well.

I was more interested in the evolution of this tree, the oak. How was it that it got to where it is on the evolutionary arc? These little cupules, how did they evolve and why? It is, like all things in nature, perfect for the task at hand, I am just not sure I understand what the task at hand is. This is where the nut is attached to the tree, maybe this umbrella is to keep the joint safe and dry. No fungus or other contaminants would be able to get in there. Most of the ones in my yard have a roughly 3/8 of an inch ring in the top of that umbrella, this is where the connection is made. I am not sure if the outer portions of the ring hold onto the nut, gripping it or all the holding power is in that little 3/8 inch patch. Not sure, but that seal is impervious to most everything.

I also did not realize that some acorns take up to 24 months to develop. I am going to have to look in my trees and see if there are some little guys hanging around, waiting to mature. I was amused by the definition I found for the cupule: “a cup-shaped anatomical structure: as a : an involucre characteristic of the oak in which the bracts are indurated and coherent b : an outer integument partially enclosing the seed of some seed ferns” Now I don’t know how smart you are but I had to look up four of the words in that definition. After up that it started to make sense, at least in an intellectual way, not so much in the evolutionary way.

Oh well, the lowly Acorn, grows into the mighty oak. I prefer red oak for building furniture but it is a very coarse grained wood. In some cases that is fine, as with a coffee table I built Bride 20 years ago.  In other ways one would want a tighter grained wood to make the peice more attractive. Anyway when I look at the cupule of the acorn, it is quite an amazing journey to get from it all the way to the indestructible table I built. I guess some things in life are truly miracles, of whatever you may believe in, and we should just recognize them as that - and sit in awe of them.

Slow down and pick up an acorn - and ponder it, and all it means,for a while!