Picea rubens (2). |
Picea rubens
Sargent 1898
Common NamesRed spruce, eastern spruce, yellow spruce, épinette rouge (Canadian French) (3).Taxonomic notesSyn: Picea australis Small 1903; P. nigra (Aiton) Link var. rubra (DuRoi) Engelmann; P. rubra (DuRoi) Link 1831, not A. Dietrich 1824. In eastern Canada this species hybridizes to a limited extent with P. mariana (Gordon 1976) (3).DescriptionTrees to 40 m tall and 100 cm dbh; "crown narrowly conic. Bark gray-brown to reddish brown. Branches horizontally spreading; twigs not pendent, rather stout, yellow-brown, densely pubescent to glabrate. Buds reddish brown, 5-8 mm, apex acute. Leaves 0.8-2.5(3) cm, 4-angled in cross section, somewhat flexuous, yellow-green to dark green, not glaucous, bearing stomates on all surfaces, apex mostly acute to sharp-pointed. Seed cones 2.3-4.5(5) cm; scales broadly fan-shaped, broadest near apex, 8-12 × 8-12 mm, stiff, margin at apex entire to irregularly toothed. 2 n =24" (3). Cones ovoid, glossy, orange-brown (c.f. P. mariana ), fusiform, matte.RangeCanada: Ontario, Québec, Prince Edward Island, New Brunswick, Nova Scotia; France: St. Pierre and Miquelon; USA: Maine, New Hampshire, Vermont, Massachusetts, Connecticut, New York, Pennsylvania, New Jersey, Maryland, Virginia, West Virginia, North Carolina and Tennessee; at 0-2000 m in upper montane to subalpine forests (3). See also (6). USDA hardiness zone 3.Big TreeHeight 37 m, dbh 137 cm, crown spread 12 m, located in Great Smoky Mountain National Park, North Carolina and Tennessee (4).OldestA crossdated age of 405 years for a specimen from Nancy Brook, NH collected by Paul Krusic (5). I believe this is from a living tree, collected in the late 1980s or early 1990s.DendrochronologyEthnobotanyObservationsCan be readily seen in high elevation forests of the Appalachian Mountains, including the Great Smokies National Park (NC/TN), the White Mountains (NH) and the Adirondacks (NY).RemarksAir pollution, including both acid preciptiation and nitrogen deposition, has been implicated in extensive dieback of red spruce forests in the Appalachian Mountains.Red spruce is the provincial tree of Nova Scotia (3). Citations(1) Silba 1986 .(2) Elias 1987 . (3) Ronald J. Taylor at the Flora of North America web site . (4) American Forests 1996 . (5) Brown 1996 . (6) Robert S. Thompson, Katherine H. Anderson and Patrick J. Bartlein. 1999. Atlas of Relations Between Climatic Parameters and Distributions of Important Trees and Shrubs in North America. U.S. Geological Survey Professional Paper 1650 A&B. URL= http://greenwood.cr.usgs.gov/pub/ppapers/p1650-a/pages/conifers.html , accessed 22-Jan-2000.
See also:
This page co-edited with Michael P. Frankis, Dec-1998. |
|
[ Picea ] [ Pinaceae ] [ home ]
This page is from the Gymnosperm Database
|