TOPIC: anyone dealt with white oak leaves

Hi guys. This is my first thread any advice would be appreciated. I live in northern mississippi and have planted a few small test plots on my section of hardwoods, they are mostly white oaks with maybe 30% tulip poplar. I have a lot of companion plants such as ferns and jack in pulpit, mayapple etc. I did plant using the hankins method and still had low germination maybe resulting from crap seed I bought early this year , but prob due to me recovering lightly with the white oak leaves. I believe they are related to kevlar. Lol I'm planning on building a tow behind mulching mover for my atv before I plant a couple pounds this fall, has anyone tried this and had better germination? thanks

Welcome benjy83,
My first planting over 15 years ago was similar. I planted 2 lbs in a woods primarily oak and beech trees with a few other mixed hardwoods. Great soil with a lot of big 45 year old plus wild ginseng. Seemed like a great spot to plant. Anyway I had about 5% or less germination due to the heavy Oak leaves.

Learned a valuable lesson. I think mulching the leaves would work. Once a plant gets past the first year or two they should be able to push up through the oak leaves. But mulching the leaves for the first 3 to 4 years would be a safer bet in my opinion.
Good luck,
Latt

Welcome to this forum, beny83!

I would be worried about poor seed, or poor plantings, more than the leaf clutter on the ground. This plant is amazingly resilient in finding it's way out from leaf clutter on the ground.

Buy good seed, plant correctly, insure at lease a 75% shade factor.... And pray for decent rain.

Good point Whit. However, when I went to check my seed in the spring back years ago, I moved some of the leaf litter around to see if the seed had germinated. It did germinate. However there were 6 inch long tiny stems everywhere under the oak leaf litter. The plant was doing it's best to push through but never found a way out. The seed has only so much stored energy and eventually just ran out of gas. Stems were thin like a pencil lead in thickness or maybe a bit thinner. The stems were white and had little green tops on them about the size of a pencil eraser but never made it though the oak leaf barrier.

It's all a learning curve for sure.
Latt

I have a lot of oak on my place (white, red, black, post, chestnut, etc)..

White and Chestnut oaks are the majority. I think the Chestnut Oak has stouter leaf than the white oak does.

I would say that on most of my place oaks make up 80% of trees.

Good for Timber but probably not as good for ginseng.

I do have good germination results (lots of 3 leafers) so I can't say that I have seen a lot of problem with oak leaves keeping them from coming up.

I have planted hankins method, and rake and scatter, and don't mulch the leaves.

I am sure there are areas where the leaves could really pile up and keep em down, but I have not seen that problem on hillsides where I plant. I don't plant a lot of flat areas, pretty much all hillsides with some good tilt to them.

TNhunter