Quercus coccinea

The scarlet oak is in the red oak group (Lobatae) in the beech or Fagaceae family,and is mainly native to the central and eastern United States, from southern Maine west to Wisconsin and Missouri, and south as far as Louisiana, Alabama, and Georgia.

• Leaves are alternate, simple, up to 23 cm long and 13 cm across, usually with 3 deep sinuses and bristle-tipped lobes on each side. They are reddish at first, turning to deep green above, paler green beneath. In October they start to turn red, to rich maroon-red by early November, then brown, hanging on the tree until the new year. Fall color is among the most vibrant red of all trees.
• The scarlet oak can be mistaken for the pin oak (Q. palustris). On scarlet oak the sinuses between lobes are "C"-shaped in comparison to pin oak which has "U"-shaped sinuses, and the acorns are half covered by a deep cap. The leaf is hairless (unlike the related pin oak, which has tufts of pale orange-brown down where the lobe veins join the central vein).
• Species is monoecious. Males are drooping catkins and females are inconspicuous small flowers.
• Twigs have reddish-brown, plums, pointed terminal buds in clusters.
• Fruit is an acorn up to 2.5 cm long, the cap covering half the nut, maturing in 2 years.