We're #3

Found a list of fastest growing trees.  Not the sort of list on which most people would expect to find oaks... but we Quercophiles know better!

#1 is paulonia... OK we'll give you that.

#2 is hybrid poplar (and yes the have the nomenclature issues common to articles on trees; the Latin binomial is given as "populus deltoides," Eastern cottonwood, when it should be Populus deltoides x nigra or some other actual hybrid).  Gives growth at 8 to 10 feet per year.  I took data one summer on hybrid poplars planted by two big paper companies in Oregon and they grew more than 12 feet starting from sticks that were jabbed into the ground and rooted.

#3?  It's listed as Nuttall oak (Quercus nuttallii).  This site lists growth at 7-8ft per year, with a height of 25 to 30ft in three years (don't run the math on that, you'll get a headache).  The point is, it grows rippin' fast.

J. Russell Smith was right: "The oak tree should sue poets for damages.  Poets have used the oak tree as a symbol for slowness - sturdy and strong, yes, but so slow, so slow! ... I am sure no poet ever grew a grove of the faster growing varieties, for he would have put speed into his oak poetry."

Photo courtesy (in the sense that I took it without asking) of the Native Tree Society.  Which segues nicely into this evening's post... assuming I get around to writing it.  That's one big Nuttall oak!