Every once in a while I come across an “unboxing” video. I’ll admit to not understanding them – why would anyone want to watch someone else opening a box with a new iPhone, or a new Xbox game?

But unboxing our acorns? That is easy for me to get my head around. Every fall we collect red oak acorns as part of our devious plan to increase numbers of our provincial tree. This past autumn we had great support from a landowner with huge amounts of acorns on his lawn. He and his wife even helped us collect the goodies.

From there, they go immediately to a stratification box (which sounds way more sophisticated than it is). Essentially, it is a box that is half-filled with a moist medium, and half-filled with acorns or other nuts, such as butternuts, beechnuts, or beaked hazelnuts. These are seeds that if we planted directly into the ground in the fall, the squirrels and mice think we’re caching food for them. The box has screening on the bottom and plywood on the top. The whole thing is then covered with a thick layer of eelgrass to prevent freezing and thawing during the winter.

The real fun starts in the spring. We peek, and we peek again. Nothing. But then one day, you see a crack in an acorn and a root emerges. The trick is always to get them in the ground before the roots get too long.

And why do we give so much importance to red oak? They are important food sources for a variety of birds and small mammals, especially red squirrels, flying squirrels, and chipmunks. They can provide a lot of value for future furniture makers and make excellent firewood. They’re also great landscape trees, providing shade and great fall colours. With their deep tap roots they help in our efforts to rebuild a resilient Acadian/Wabanaki forest. And finally, red oak is our provincial tree, though it is far from common – it behooves us to restore this species, among many others that cry out for our attention.

In my ideal forest policy, every landowner on Prince Edward Island with suitable habitat – relatively dry sites for planting – would be given ten free seedlings. If the landowner looked after them, they could get ten more the next year. This way, you create seed sources throughout the province and reward landowners for nurturing their trees.

It would also include having red oak planted on every publicly owned property, including schoolgrounds. And to be extra clear, I’m not talking about plantations of red oak. That would be like someone who drives recklessly just changing his car and not his driving habits. These plantings would enrich the areas. And it is not just planting the tree – itself a good thing. But it is the concept of planting seed sources. We see oak producing acorns in under fifteen years. Those acorns then get spread throughout the area by members of the squirrel family and blue jays. Some of these buried acorns will sprout and grow into the next generation of mighty oaks. Which will then continue this amazing cycle of regeneration and healing.