How do you select your crop trees? How many crop trees should you select? Generally, you can't go wrong with white oak, but what if you have two white oaks side-by-side? What can you do with a clump of stump sprouts? This section will answer some of these questions.
Tips for:
You will notice that white oak appears as a suggested crop tree, regardless of your goals. When in doubt, choose some white oaks as your crop trees.
Choose trees with larger crowns that are taller than, or the same height as, the other trees in the stand. These trees have the best chance of succeeding.
Twenty to thirty crop trees per acre is a good target number, but you might only find a few trees per acre that meet your goals and selection criteria, and that is alright.
Avoid selecting crop trees with structural weaknesses such as strong leans or obvious signs of rot. Crop trees are meant to be around for a long time.
Choose high value species with straight, relatively branch-free stems, no diseases, cavities, or scars. The white oak in the thumbnail above is a great crop tree!
Avoid selecting leaning trees as your crop trees. Timber takes a long time to mature, and leaning trees are a risk.
Selecting a variety of crop tree species is important for wildlife. The variety of mast-producing species, the more likely there will be annual crops of food.
Oaks are great wildlife crop trees. If you have several kinds of oak, try to select species in both the white and red oak groups as your crop trees. This will help provide wildlife with a more dependable food source.
Wildlife really don't care of a tree is straight, forked, or beautiful.
Healthy trees with cavities can be considered for your crop trees.
5. Taller trees are preferred, but shorter trees that might only receive light on the top of their crowns might be considered crop trees if they are mast-producing. Serviceberry is a great example of a shorter tree worthy of being a wildlife crop tree.
If flowers or fall color is important to you, stem straightness might be less important.
You might select crop trees on the edges of your forest to spotlight beautiful trees and to encourage full and healthy crowns.
Crop tree release tree selection with Dr David Carter.
selection depends on goals
white oak is a good timber tree and wildlife tree
large crown is important
do not remove too many competitors
Species and shade tolerance both influence how fast trees grow with Dr David Carter.
tree size is a terrible indicator of age
shade intolerant species such as yellow-poplar tend to grow fast
more shade tolerant species such as hickory and red maple tend to grow slowly
How tree origin (seed or stump sprout) affects crop tree selection with Dr David Carter.
hardwoods can regenerate from seed or old stumps
either can create good crop trees
How to determine how many crop trees to release many per acre with Dr David Carter.
