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Portrait of Sessile oak

Nature · Trees

Sessile oak

Deciduous · to 20–40 m

Quercus petraea — Fagaceae

The sessile or durmast oak is the other native British oak, dominant in the hilly west and north — the Atlantic oakwoods of Wales, the Lake District and western Scotland. It is told from the pedunculate oak by a straightforward reversal: its leaves have long stalks and its acorns have none. It is the national tree of both Wales and Ireland.

How to know it

Whole tree of Sessile oak
Whole tree ArthurMcGill · CC BY-SA 4.0
Leaf of Sessile oak
Leaf Willow · CC BY 2.5
Bark of Sessile oak
Bark Unknown · CC BY-SA 2.5

How to spot them

  • ▸Leaves on a distinct stalk 1–2 cm long, with lobes that taper evenly and no ear-like auricles at the base
  • ▸Acorns sitting directly on the twig, stalkless (sessile), usually in small clusters
  • ▸Straighter trunk and a more regular, upswept crown than the pedunculate oak
  • ▸Fine pale hairs along the veins on the underside of the leaf

How to know it

Leaves carried on a clear stalk, but the fruit sits stalkless and tight against the twig

Sessile oak — Quercus petraea, the exact reverse of Quercus robur.

The dominant tree of the Atlantic rainforest woods of Snowdonia, Cumbria and Argyll, hung with mosses and lichens

Sessile oak.

Its specific epithet means 'of rocky places', matching its upland, acid-soil strongholds

Sessile oak — Quercus petraea.

Also called the durmast; it is the national tree of both Wales and Ireland

Sessile oak.

Fine pale hairs run along the veins beneath a leaf whose lobes taper evenly and lack ear-like flaps

Sessile oak.

Coppiced for centuries in the west for charcoal and tanbark, feeding the early iron industry

Sessile oak.

Quick-fire facts

  • •Quercus petraea: petraea means 'of rocky places', from Greek petra, a rock
  • •Also known as durmast oak, and as Welsh or Irish oak
  • •Leaves stalked, acorns stalkless — the opposite arrangement to English (pedunculate) oak
  • •The two native oaks hybridise freely, so many British oaks are intermediate and hard to name
  • •It dominates the western Atlantic oakwoods, a temperate rainforest rich in mosses, liverworts and lichens
  • •Sessile oak is the national tree of Wales and of Ireland
  • •Its bark was stripped for tanning and its wood burnt for charcoal to smelt iron in Wales and the Weald
  • •Unlike English oak it tolerates thin, acid upland soils and grows at higher altitude

Drill it — 6 cards

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Sources