White oak trees take one season to produce acorns, once the tree reaches maturity. So, rain you get this Spring produces this years acorns. Red oaks take two seasons. So, rain you got two Springs ago help produce these acorns. That's why you have one or the other, most times. A bumper crop of both red and white usually means you had a wet Spring back to back.

What We Know About Acorn Production

Acorns of trees in the white oak group (subgenus Lepidobalanus) mature in 3 months; those in the red oak group (subgenus Erythrobalanus) require 15 months (two growing seasons]. However, in both species groups, acorn production is relatively unpredictable from year to year. On average, most species produce a good crop of acorns one year in three or four. In years of low or moderate acorn production, most acorns are consumed by insects. Moreover, the production of acorns differs among species. Some species are inherently better acorn producers than others, and different species tend to produce good acorn crops in different years. Although environmental factors unfavorable to acorn production such as late spring frost and summer drought tend to obscure inherent periodicity (cycles) in production, new evidence suggests that such periodicity occurs at 2-, 3-, and 4-year intervals for black, white, and northern red oaks, respectively.

Other factors being equal, trees of large diameter produce more acorns than trees of small diameter. However, in some species, production declines after the tree reaches a threshold diameter (fig. 1). Oaks with crowns fully exposed to light, such as dominant and co-dominant trees, produce more acorns than trees with crowns totally or partially shaded. In the white oak group, when one tree produces well, all of the potential acorn-producing trees in the population tend to produce well. In contrast, in the red oak group, some producers yield well in a given year while others do not. In addition, only a relatively small proportion of trees are inherently good seed

For example, among white oaks in Pennsylvania, only 30 percent of large, healthy trees produced any acorns even in good seed years and an even smaller proportion produced a good crop in those years.

http://woodlandsteward.squarespace.com/s...nProduction.htm

Hardwood cutover with some midsize oaks dropping acorns in the thickets is some fine huntin'

In fact, the only thing consistently predictable about acorn production is its inconsistency.

I work primarily with oak forest properties. Yet after years of watching and studying them, I've given up on trying to find the exact conditions that produce good or poor acorn years. There just isn't any consistent predictor (with the exception of a late freeze that kills oak blooms or a severe summer drought).

But one of the keys to managing deer in an oak forest environment is to NEVER count on acorns to feed the deer in fall/winter. I don't even consider acorns--despite their incredible impact on herd health--in calculations of carrying capacity. An individual property can be flooded with acorns in one year and have a complete acorn failure the next. In fact, the only thing consistently predictable about acorn production is its inconsistency.

You're being facetious, right? The WORST thing I can imagine is a good acorn crop into a 5-year-old cutover. Then the deer have all the food they want in the middle of zero-visibility (and zero-access) habitat.

As much as I love what a bumper acorn crop can do for herd health, I HATE the hunting results. When deer don't have to move more than 5 yards to find their prime food source, they won't move any farther.

Ours don't seem to cycle. Ours tend to be tied to rain. We've had Swamp Chestnut oaks drop years in a row. I've noticed some water oaks drop in January some years, when they would normally start dropping in October.

N2TRKYS,
When we spoke a few weeks ago, you mentioned that with the good wet spring we've had the last couple of years, that you anticipated good acorn crops for both red and white this fall, didn't you? When I was at the farm last weekend I saw massive groups of acorns growing on trees all throughout the area. I think you were dead on with your observations regarding weather. Hope so anyway.

Timber value wise, clear cutting or heavily thinning around oaks is the worst thing you can do.

Your season closes before ours and I could see where that could make it a little tougher. I assume season can be over before all acorns are gone in your area.