Hi, Yes we have beautiful indigenous trees in South Africa to choose from. We purchased the property 7 years ago and they were already dead by then, pity I did not plant replacement trees immediately. We are on the Highveld, "Highfield" region of South Africa which is not ideal but there are huge Pin Oaks and English Oak growing in other gardens. The Highveld is +-5800 feet above sea level, summer rainfall, cold icy winter mornings not the Oak trees natural habitat. We also have winter grass fires due to the dry weather in winter, and this is what killed them as our 10 acre property was overgrown. The previous owner stopped the project in 1985 but left an established garden. We are also blessed with huge Acacia Caffras and Karoo types. Also there are invasive species like the Eucalyptus and wattles. I would like to replace them as it is a lane and I would like to continue with the uniform look. Thank you for the advice.

Hello, so far I have found, the Regal Prince is getting wider, its filling in denser and its trunk is really thicking up more than the Scarlet. Fall colors are good on the Regal, but I would have to say compared to the Scarlet, hands down great color to the Scarlet. On the Scarlet, it has definitely shown its quicker growth rate abilities, and is stretching upwards at an alarming rate! The Scarlet is staying much more columnar and more open than the Regal Prince. However, the Scarlet is a younger tree than the Regal Prince is, so once it catches up to the Regal Prince, who k he ows all what could change.The trunk of the Scarlet oak is thickening up, but at a much slower rate than the Regal Prince for sure. I'm thinking the Regal Prince is gonna be a bigg'in for sure. Hope this helped, cheers.

Sorry if I confused I meant southeastern US native ( the Live oak) so it IS native here. Most of the oaks planted in the US are native to the US. More than are in Europe and other locales. I have only 2 non US natives well 3 trees 2 English oaks and 1 Lebanon oak all from acorns. I hope I haven't forgot any. The Lebanon oak is a slow grower, but, I haven't given it any water since it has a taproot from growing from acorn, but we've had no drought. I love my English oaks, they can live 1,000 years in Europe, they were grown from acorns, so I don't know if that will help them in any way, but, I like knowing they could live at they least 600-800 years maybe, if nobody chops them down after I croak. I do have another 6-7 Compton oaks that could live that long (maybe) they are a newish hybrid the oldest are 200 years old. They could get pretty old they are a Live oak and overcup oak hybrid. There is a mature example in Williamsburg, Va

Well, this is certainly an interesting place for a highly technical discussion about rare oaks, especially intersectional hybrids. My name is Dave. I was the guy in charge of planting 9,000 trees around the Apple Park Campus. About 4,000 of them were oaks of more than 60 taxa. My website is www.oaktopia.org. My iNaturalist page is: https://www.inaturalist.org/observations?place_id=any&user_id=oaktopia&verifiable=any I thought I'd throw in some direct experience with intersectional hybrids after having grown tens of thousands of oaks of dozens of different taxa. My learning laboratory initially was the Shields Oak Grove at Univ. of California Davis, the Stanford University campus, and anywhere else I could either plant an interesting tree, or find an interesting and unknown tree. My first oddball oak was a super random Q. x hispanica in the Don Ramos Park in Palo Alto. Took me a month to ID the tree. It's on my iNaturalist page. This discovery opened the door to many subsequent discoveries. Regarding intersectionals. For this discussion, probably the most interesting observation concerrns Q. tomentella (Island Oak - CA super rare native) and Q. ilex. After learning that Q. tomentella grows over wide areas of California, I sought them out. Found a nursery that had a bunch, and went to look. And all of them looked as much like Q. ilex as Q. tomentella! There were nearly 100 trees in the block, all intermediate. I got into quite an argument with an 85 year old nurseryman over it. Years later, I learned where he got his seed - and it was from an authentic island-sourced Q. tomentella, except that mother tree was surrounded by Q. ilex! Then I moved to Santa Barbara, and found more of these tomentella x ilex all over town. As I spoke with other professionals about this oddity, I received confirmation these hybrids were being seen all over the state. So I bought 50 of the hybrids, and grew them for 5 years. Some of them were heavy acorn producers, and we attempted to grow seedlings. But, as noted elsewhere in the science listed here, the acorns either didn't germinate, or gave incredibly weak offspring. The hybrids themselves are actually pretty nice ornamental trees, being rather better than either parent in an ornamental setting. But there is of course a fair bit of variability. My other experience in intersectionals comes from the Shields Oak Grove. The biggest trees are Q. castaneifolia (though European oak collectors pointed out that they are actually Q. castaneifolia x cerris from the giant mother tree in Kew Gardens). Regardless, I've grown upwards of 5,000 seedlings from these trees over the last 15 years. The seedlings turn out to be quite variable in leaf shape and growth habit. And, many of the seedlings showed an enlarge central leaf sinus. Wonder how that got there? Might it be related to the enormous Q. macrocarpa located 200 feet away, across a big lawn? The Int'l Oak Society people I showed the trees all said it was just Q. cerris showing up, and in fact they all just call these hybrids Q. cerris from looking, which does not fit well with the actuality of these trees. Interestingly, the vigor on these trees is pretty much off the charts - we see 5 feet per year with decent watering and soils. Super vigorous. Haven't done progeny testing on these - that will be interesting. In the Shields Grove is also a Q. trojana which everyone I've talked with agrees is actually Q. trojana. A lovely little tree shown on my iNaturalist page. But again I've grown thousands of nice seedlings, and almost all of them have an enlarged central sinus! And what are the trees growing next to that lovely little Q. trojana? More Q. macrocarpa. But these Q. trojana seedlings are much more uniform than my the Q. castaneifolia hybrids. And they also show excellent vigor. I'm seeing what looks like an intersectional hybrid with good vigor, which might suggest greater genetic affinity than currently recognized. Haven't done the progeny testing yet on these either. As for the hybrid that started the thread, suber x robur, it's not really of interest to me. Having grown upward of 1,000 Q. suber, I know all too well that they are semi-evergreen, not evergreen. They drop their leaves sometime in March typically, and it takes them 4 to 6 weeks to get their leaves back. In the meantime, it's always fun to field inquiries from clients asking why all the Cork Oaks suddenly died.... And we get hideous sooty mold and honeydew drip off Q. robur throughout coastal California with our enhanced marine layer. I do like Q. x hispanica, and have actually managed to grow four of them by collecting acorns off a Q. suber in the Shields Grove that was literally growing next to a Q. cerris. But no Q. x hispanica are truly evergreen. For my evergreen trees, I turn to nature, and look south. Into the Madro-Tertiary flora with dozens of well-adapted evergreen oaks. Q. hypoleucoides is just going into commercial production in California, thanks to my efforts, along with Q. rugosa and Q. oblongifolia. The trees we really need in California are in the Sierra Madre of northwestern Mexico, one of the noted global Quercus hotspots, but the entire area is cartel controlled and considered highly dangerous. Have fun and stay safe.