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If you've noticed a surplus of acorns crunching under your tires, threatening to roll your ankles and bouncing off your car roof this fall, you're not imagining things.
Following a bad season for the falling nuts last year, this fall is yielding a bumper crop. Experts say most of the surplus acorns are from red oaks, which produce acorns every two years.
Red oaks tend to flower more during drought seasons, James West told the Raleigh News & Observer. West, who runs North Carolina's Goldsboro-based nursery and tree improvement program, said the 2008 drought is now producing a delayed acorn surplus.
"It's kind of a big year," he said. "For me, it's great. I get more seed."
White oaks are also responsible for some of the acorns all around town, but since they turn out a crop every year they're not as prolific.
Red oaks make up about three quarters of the city's oak canopy.
Patrick George, a certified arborist and owner of Heartwood Tree Service in Charlotte, said he's not surprised by the hearty load of nuts.
"With the amount of rain that we got following the amount of dry weather we had, it's not that unusual," he said.
The abundance of acorns pinging off roofs and crunching underfoot might be a minor annoyance or surprise for humans, but it should be a welcome relief to area wildlife, such as squirrels and deer. Many rely on acorns during the lean winter months.
A 2007 Easter freeze kept many red oak trees that were flowering from being pollinated, experts say. Local animals suffered a tough winter, as last fall's acorn haul was notably subpar.
