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How Oak Trees Evolved to Rule the Forests of the Northern Hemisphere

from Scientific American, August 2020

How Oak Trees Evolved to Rule the Forests of the Northern Hemisphere Scientific American, August 2020 If you were dropped into virtually any region of North America 56 million years ago, you probably would not recognize where you had landed. The northeastern U.S. ranged from broad-leaved (as opposed to needle-leaved) evergreen forest to deciduous forests of ginkgo, viburnum, birch and elm, among other species. The deciduous broad-leaved forests that now cover 11% of North America north of Mexico were in their infancy. But that was about to change, with the spread and extraordinary diversification of what would eventually become some of the most ecologically and economically significant woody plants in the world: the acorn-bearing, wind-pollinated trees we call oaks. READ MORE

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