First 4x5 ever

Why would you want those objects out of focus. I actually like the image as is.

Since this is your first shot pat yourself on the back.

Thanks, I guess I was just thinking at the time it would be more of a "Portrait" of an old oak. Telephone poles and cars on the road seemed to take away from that. Then again, I have a lot to learn. Thanks Again, it feels good to hear.

You will never lose DOF using a fast film, as you will run out of shutter speed and be forced to use small f stops.
Portraits of trees on sunny days are tough, as the sky will always provide ample distraction of excessively light areas to take away from the view of the tree. Hence the dark shadowy trunk and branches with very little texture in them. Metering for the shadows at, say, Z III would force the sky to Z X or force you to lower contrast with decreased development.

Great first attempt. You will have the bug now ;-) You don't say what lens you are using. The DOF effects you see in LF are often achieved through tilt. Slight forward tilt would have brought the background out of focus as well as some of the bottom of the tree, with a sharp top half of the tree...once you understand the levers you will get more creative. K

Ah yeah, sorry I should add that somewhere.

Calumet Caltar II 210mm w/ a chip out of the rear cell. Apuger DarinWC floated it my way so I could get started in my 4x5 venture. Mounted in a Prontor Press shutter I bought as a parts shutter. I took it apart and cleaned it up and put a very small bit of lube on the timing mechanism. The "2nd shot" was at 1 second and seemed to be fairly well exposed.

Where in Jacksonville? (It's my hometown - looks vaguely familiar.)

It's called 4 corners Park in Murray Hill area which is somewhat part of Riverside.

If you wanted to give the impression of narrow DOF you could have used a swing movement to bring the tree into focus and throw out everything on either side (both behind/front) of it.