Thanks be that there were only scrub oak (a nasty, invasive scrub) near my birthplace, hence none of these wild English stories. Our trees were pine, spruce, aspen and cottonwood. Oak was brought in as flooring, furniture or coffins. The last is pointed to by a rhyme that we used to sing as children:

Oh, we chopped down that old oak tree
And tuk it away to the mill
To make a coffin so fine
For that old dawg of mine
Oh, they chopped down that old oak tree.

Lots of stories instead about the big cottonwoods along the rivers and arroyos. La Llorona wailed as she wandered through them at night. Outlaws hid there. The big cats from the mountains came down the washes at night and ate children who played there after dark. They were the site of the ultimate 'frontier justice'.