I don’t consider myself an expert on trees, but I probably know more than most people considering my mother’s insistence that I know the names of her favorite trees and my trips to the National Arboretum growing up. One of the things we noticed (and my mother complained about) were what felt like a lack of trees in this state. The trees in Texas are different than the trees on the East Coast. For one thing, they are a lot smaller, so it feels like there are fewer of them. I grew up in an area called Rock Creek Forest (which is exactly what it sounds like), so I am used to being surrounded by tall trees that make me feel small. All of this said, I was very pleased to find this was a type of Oak tree. Something my mom complained about Texas was that there were “only those ugly gnarled oak trees.” Not true, Mom! I tried to look up the type of oak this was in one of the plant books that were provided to us, but this proved difficult as it looked like it could be multiple possibilities. I’m grateful someone on iNaturalist identified this tree.
iNaturalist: https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/5434013