Plant · P-572

Cork Oak

Quercus suber

Cork Oak is the Mediterranean evergreen whose bark is the world's cork - the only oak that can have its bark stripped repeatedly, every 9 to 12 years, without killing the tree. The first harvest doesn't come until the tree is 15 to 30 years old, and even that first strip is low grade; it's the later strippings, decades further on, that produce the valuable cork. Along the way it also yields an acorn edible once its tannin is leached out, though one wild Moroccan population produces acorns sweet enough to eat raw, tasting of chestnut. It thrives on poor, sandy, acidic ground and shrugs off drought and strong wind, but grows slowly at every stage and does poorly on chalky or lime-rich soil despite sometimes being described as lime tolerant.