“This species produced a black-brown dye used for inks and for coloring silks…”– Fun Facts
Entire plant, Quercus acutissima (Spoelberch, 2007)
Quercus acutissima was initially named and published by William Carruthers (1862) and has not changed since. Quercus acutissima is part of a large genus of ~500 species, many of which hybridize with each other, making identification and species delimitation challenging.
The Sawtooth oak can sometimes be mistaken for an American chestnut, Castanea dentata, as they have similar leaf appearances and are in the same family Fagaceae (Gilman & Watson, 1994). Their fruit can help to differentiate them: Quercus acutissima has an acorn where some of the nut is exposed under the cap whereas Castanea dentata has a bur-like fruit and no part of the nut is exposed. Sawtooth oak may also be confused with Quercus castanefolia, the Chestnut-leaved Oak, but its leaves lack bristles at vein ends (Coombes & Cameron, 2021).
Sawtooth Oak produces tannins, a chemical used in preparing and dying textiles. This species produced a black-brown dye used for inks and for coloring silks, a critically important species along the silk road (Tamburini, 2022).
Native
Introduced
Sawtooth oak prefers well drained acidic soils but will adapt to almost any situation except high alkalinity settings (Gilman & Watson, 1994). Because of its adaptability, it can become invasive, outcompeting native species. For this reason, it is not advised to plant this as a landscape plant.
Quercus acutissima has been assessed as a species that is of least concern for extinction (IUCN, 2018).
