All five oak trees are native to this region, meaning many caterpillars, moths, and butterflies will find nourishment and home within their branches. Illustrations ©Robert O’Brien.

By Susan Messer

During the recent Wild Ones/Green Community Connections Native Tree & Shrub Sale, a customer ordered five species of oak tree. Valerie Kehoe, from the sale’s planning team, wondered why this person had ordered so many oak tree varieties. Curious minds wanted to know, and so I set off to find out.

“I grew up near Elgin,” Sanjay Shivpuri of Oak Park told me. “We had 2 to 3 acres of land, with maybe 10 to 15 oak trees on our property. So much of my growing up I spent running around those oak trees, climbing them, watching them, living with them.”

The trees were huge, he told me, over 100 years old. “They were beautiful trees, and they dropped thousands of acorns—so many, it was like snow falling.” The squirrels, the bark, the branches were everywhere—the trunks so wide, you couldn’t wrap your arms around them.

“When I moved to Oak Park about six years ago,” Shivpuri said, “I saw lots of trees, but not a lot of oaks, and I wanted some around me. When the village cut trees down near our house, we suddenly had a lot of space, a lot of empty lawn, and I wanted to introduce diversity.”

All five varieties are native to the Midwest (of course they are! They came from a Wild Ones sale!), and he planted them himself. He dug the holes and let his children—age 6 and 8—decide which tree would go in which hole. “They helped me fill the holes with dirt,” he said, “mulch them, water them. We check on the trees every couple days. We take a walk around, see how they’re doing, whether they need mulch, whether they need water. The children gave each tree a name.”

Quick diagram of oak tree nomenclature, drawn by Shivpuri’s children.

At which point the children took the opportunity to list them out for me: Oreo, Snagletooth, Clark, George, and Fred.

As for the more scientific names, the family’s five new neighbors are a White Oak (Quercus alba), a Hill’s Oak (Quercus ellipsoidalis), a Chinquapin Oak (Quercus muehlenbergii), a Swamp White Oak (Quercus bicolor), and a Bur Oak (Quercus macrocarpa). The White Oak is the Illinois state tree, and a symbol of Midwestern history and landscape.

“I’ll be dead before these trees grow very big,” Sanjay told me. They’re no more than a foot or two now. “They won’t even be very large in my children’s time. Maybe for my grandchildren. But someday this corner will have five giant oaks, and all the shade, the acorns, the beauty they provide. These trees will be here for some future children who live in this neighborhood.”