page_title: Quercus rubra
section_title: Uses
hierarchical_section_title: Quercus rubra / Uses
caption_attribution_description: w:Quercus rubra – Red Oak From w:Romeyn Beck Hough's fourteen-volume work The American Woods, a collection of over 1000 paper-thin wood samples representing more than 350 varieties of North American tree.
context_page_description: Quercus rubra, the northern red oak, is an oak tree in the red oak group. It is a native of North America, in the eastern and central United States and southeast and south-central Canada. It grows from the north end of the Great Lakes, east to Nova Scotia, south as far as Georgia, Mississippi, Alabama, and Louisiana, and west to Oklahoma, Kansas, Nebraska, and Minnesota. It has been introduced to small areas in Western Europe, where it can frequently be seen cultivated in gardens and parks. It prefers good soil that is slightly acidic. Often simply called red oak, northern red oak is so named to distinguish it from southern red oak, also known as the Spanish oak. It is sometimes called champion oak. It is also the state tree of New Jersey and the provincial tree of Prince Edward Island.
context_section_description: The northern red oak is one of the most important oaks for timber production in North America. Quality red oak is of high value as lumber and veneer, while defective logs are used as firewood. Other related oaks are also cut and marketed as red oak, although their wood is not always of as high a quality. These include eastern black oak, scarlet oak, pin oak, Shumard oak, southern red oak and other species in the red oak group. Construction uses include flooring, veneer, interior trim, and furniture. It is also used for lumber, railroad ties, and fence posts.
  Red oak wood grain is so open that smoke can be blown through it from end-grain to end-grain on a flat-sawn board. For this reason, it is subject to moisture infiltration and is unsuitable for outdoor uses such as boatbuilding or exterior trim.
caption: Wood; from Romeyn Beck Hough's fourteen-volume work The American Woods
exif: {"Image Orientation": "Horizontal (normal)", "Image XResolution": "1", "Image YResolution": "1", "Image ResolutionUnit": "Pixels/Inch", "Image ExifOffset": "90", "EXIF ExifImageWidth": "600", "EXIF ExifImageLength": "892"}