FURRY FRIENDS WILL HAVE COMPETITION FOR ACORNS THIS YEAR

OLIVE BRANCH, Ill. -- Most consumers of acorns are furred or feathered. But the deer, raccoons, wild turkeys and quail will have competition for the oak tree fruits this weekend.

The 11th annual Cache River Wetlands acorn pick-up will be held at Horseshoe Lake Conservation Area this weekend.

As many as 500 Boys Scouts, Girl Scouts and other groups will participate in the acorn roundup.

There should be no shortage of acorns, says Jean Hinkle, of the United States Fish and Wildlife Service, which has offices at Shawnee Community College near Ullin, Ill. "Acorns are plentiful this year."Anyone can participate in the acorn pick-up."We'll be registering participants near the Horseshoe Lake spillway area," said Hinkle. Collections will get under way at 8 a.m. Saturday and Sunday.

The acorns will be used to restore bottomland hardwoods in the Cache River Wetlands, a 35,000-acre, 30-mile long wetlands project between Dongola and Cairo.

The acorn roundup is being sponsored by the Illinois Nature Conservancy in partnership with the Fish & Wildlife Service. Each participant of the weekend hunt will received a special patch designed for the acorn round-up.

Special arrangements are available for Scout groups to plan an overnight stay. Additional information on camping is available by contacting Dave Maginel, at the nature conservatory, at (618) 634-2524.

The acorns are placed in coolers until early next spring, when the Fish and Wildlife Services haul out its special acorn planter to place the seeds in the ground.

Some small oaks, planted over the past decade, can be observed in some areas of the wetlands district, ranging in height to about five feet. Actually, oaks don't start producing acorns until they are about 20 years old.

But oaks grow slowly and are around for a long time -- from 200 to 400 years.

There are more than 300 varieties of oaks in North America -- white oak, red oak, English oak, Holm oak, live oak, Northern red oak, turkey oak, Blackjack oak, to name a few.

One tree can put an impressive amount of wildlife food on the ground. Experts estimate that an average oak can produce 5,000 acorns during a typical season, with bumper crops every four or five years, with trees producing up to 15,000 acorns during a season.

And this is the year for the bumper crop.

Where do the acorns go.

It is estimated that 83 percent of the acorns are eaten by animals and birds. Six percent were eaten or destroyed by insects. Some 10 percent of the crop is estimated as naturally imperfect, flawed from the start, leaving only 1 percent of the acorns for human consumption or as new oak sprouts.

Indians ate acorns, boiling them to take out the bitter tastes.

But acorns rank right up there among so-called health foods in terms of nourishment. They are high in protein and B vitamins and are low in fat. The element that keeps acorns from being a popular item on today's menus is the simple fact they just don't taste good.

Acorns from family of oaks classified as white oaks are best for eating. Often referred to as "sweet" acorns. In reality, they are bland. On the other side are the red oak acorns, a group normally referred to as "bitter" acorns, and that is an accurate description.

All acorns are high in tannic acid content, and that is what gives the nut meat the bitter tastes. Tannic acid is yellowish astringent substance used in the tanning of hides and some dying processes.

The white oak acorns simply have less tannic acid.

There are some people who know how to remove the tannic from the acorns, which make them more palatable. They most often boil whole or pulverized acorns, changing the water repeatedly until it grows clear instead of brownish, indicating that the tannin is out.

Once free of the acid, the acorn meat can be ground into a sort of flour and used to bake bread.