Pin oak (Quercus palustris) is a medium sized tree that has a distinctive pyramidal form.
The leaves are simple, alternate, 3 to 6 inches long. Pin oak has 5 to 9 bristle-tipped lobes with very deep sinuses that extend almost to the midrib.
Pin oak fruit is an small acorn 1/2 inch long, round but flat at the cap.
The bark of the pin oak is Gray-brown and very tight and thin. Remains smooth for many years but eventually develops thin ridges and furrows.
As with all oaks the acorns are valuable food for many animal species including turkey and deer.
Pin oak is a term that is commonly used in the south in reference to water oak, laurel oak, shingle oak and willow oak.
Pin oaks can be found from southwestern New England west to extreme southern Ontario, southern Michigan, northern Illinois, and Iowa; south to Missouri, eastern Kansas, and northeastern Oklahoma; then east to central Arkansas, Tennessee, central North Carolina, and Virginia.