A Naif in the Forest by Darrell Berger

Wing Tips to Hiking Boots: Musings of a New, Full-Time Poconos Resident 

Receiving an oak leaf cluster is a military honor. In heraldry, the oak leaf indicates independence, the acorn fertility. Gravestones have used oak leaves and acorns as decorations, indicating the cycle of life. In mythology the oak is the tree of both Thor and Zeus. In 2004 the US Congress declared it the national tree. 

When I wandered through the forest recently, and saw a lot more acorns than last year, I wasn’t just seeing nuts that squirrels, deer, jays and turkeys depend on. I was seeing the bounty from the tree of the gods, the tree of military and national honor. 

Acorns are plentiful in alternating years. Oaks work very hard one year and rest the next. Humans once depended on the size of the acorn harvest because acorn flour was a staple. No wonder oaks were sacred. Native Americans particularly valued them. Many communities still have or remember “council oaks,” where important tribal meetings were held. 

If the oak has long been of vital importance to everybody in the forest, the squirrel is vitally important to the oak. For an acorn to grow into a tree, it prefers to be in the earth sixty to ninety feet from the parent, away from shade, with a source of underground nourishment that is not consumed by the parent. Squirrels are the primary vehicles for transporting acorns. 

Squirrels have a very good memory for where they have cached food, but it isn’t perfect. Some squirrels don’t survive to eat all they have stored. Only a miniscule percentage of acorns grow into oaks, yet enough to keep the forest replenished. 

Thus the tree of Thor and Zeus and America needs squirrels. Yet nobody calls squirrels the rodent of Thor. Valiant soldiers are not decorated with brass and silver squirrels. Squirrels are not the official nut gatherer of the United States. I have yet to see a gravestone with a squirrel motif. We find once again that the work of the smallest is required for the mightiest to survive, yet goes unheralded.