Urban Nuts For Wild Pigs
Fueled by my recent discovery of acorns dropping in a local park and mystified by the varied shapes of leaves, trunks and acorns there I investigated the subject of oaks and their appearance a little further. Our local park harbors at least two different varieties of oak trees and possibly a number of hybrids.
Wild pigs and California oak trees have several things in common: They come in a variety of shapes, sizes and appearances. Both are also prolific reproducers – given a chance. Both hybridize easily and have adapted to a wide variety of habitats.
Wild boar and mast producing trees entertain a quasi-symbiotic relationship. In fact, wild pigs in America would still be domestic swine were it not for acorn and other mast nuts. Early farming settlers used to let the forests and oak lands feed their pigs until it was time to drive them back home for slaughter. Pigs that objected to this treatment by running away and hiding are the ancestors of the much maligned wild pigs of the present. In a sense the ancestors of the ranchers and farmers who complain so much about damage done by wild boar actually created the problem.
Oak trees on the other hand have always been part of Californian landscapes. So much so that in some parts of the state oak trees are the dominant trees or shrubs. The most common oak tree in California is the Coast Live Oak (quercus agrifolia). It is also the tree most closely associated with wild pigs. Most hunters have seen the majestic lone oak standing in the middle of a grassy area – with heavy rooting under it during fall and winter. Their leaves are of the type shown on the right of this picture. As you can see they are curling downward a little at the edges. They also have small, sharp spines around the edge.
In the context of this article it is kind of mute anyway because owner of the leaves on the left carries only very few acorns compared to the load of acorns found on the Coastal Oak trees.
Here is the picture of the one in the park. It is chock-full of acorns. A great find for any wild pig. But there are none in the park, at least not of the four-legged kind.
The oak tree is framed by a pine tree on the right and some spindly thing without leaves on the left. Most of its branches are heavy with acorns. The ground underneath it is full of them as you can see in the following picture.
Strangely enough, many of the other Coastal Oaks in the park carry fewer acorns compared to this one. As I pointed out in one of my previous articles on oak mast, not all oak trees produce the first year after a good rainfall. Some grow a bumper load of acorn in the second year. Maybe that explains why one of the oaks has all the acorn and the others have grown only relatively few this year.
What these trees lack in quantity they make up for in the quality of their acorn. Look at these beautiful acorn nuts.
Note the brown cradles in which the acorn sit. When the acorn nut drops, most of the brown, dried footers remain on the tree to eventually drop off as well. Here is a closeup of an acorn in its shell with a number of budding acorn/shells right next to it.
And these are the empty homes of acorns that dropped a while ago.
All pictures above feature Coastal California Oaks and their seeds.
The other type of oak growing in the park has not yet set enough acorns to contribute significantly to the acorn drop for this year. Let's at least look at the tree as a reminder and for field identification. This oak tree has a dome shaped crown that you can spot from far away.
The lower tree branches are obscured in the dark background. They extend rather far down with the lowest leaves hanging barely 6 feet above the ground.
This kind of oak tree features prominently in one of my ideal wild pig hunting scenarios: A free standing majestic domed oak shade tree on an open meadow surrounded by brush inviting boar to rest and relax from the heat and to partake of the acorns that liberally cover the ground. In my dream I survey a sounder of wild pigs from a hillock carefully selecting the animal to harvest. I have found the tree, the meadow and the hillock in the past. Only the wild boar were missing every time.
So, why are oak trees and wild pigs in a symbiotic relationship, you ask?
I do not know for sure. To say so just sounded good and educated.
On the other hand, oak trees could profit from the dispersal of their seeds by wild pigs.
But detractors of boar claim that wild hogs not only eat the acorn but trample them into the ground, damage them and prevent them from sprouting. Some scientists say that is not necessarily so. They maintain that moderate rooting for acorns on the ground is indeed beneficial for oak nut dispersal.
Is the real answer that wild pigs fertilize the soil while feeding under magnificent California oak trees?
You tell me.
PJJ
