Eastern White Pine
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Eastern White Pine (Pinus strobus) is a large pine native to eastern North America, occurring from Newfoundland west to Minnesota and southeasternmost Manitoba, and south along the Appalachian Mountains to the extreme north of Georgia.
It is a member of the white pine group, Pinus subgenus Strobus, and like all members of that group, the leaves ('needles') are in fascicles (bundles) of five, with a deciduous sheath. They are flexible, blue-green, finely serrated, and 5-13 cm (2-5 in) long, and persist for usually about 18 months. The cones are slender, 8-16 cm (3-6 in) long (rarely slightly longer) and 4-5 cm (1.5-2 in) broad when open, and have scales with a rounded apex and slightly reflexed tip. The seeds are 4-5 mm long, with a slender 15-20 mm wing, and are wind-dispersed. Cone production peaks every 3 to 5 years. Mature trees can be 200 years old; some live as long as 400 years. It prefers well-drained soil and cool, humid climates, but also grows in boggy areas and rocky highlands.
Eastern White Pine is the tallest tree in eastern North America. In natural pre-colonial stands it grew to about 70 m (230 ft) tall, but current trees typically reach 30-50 m (100 - 160 ft) tall with a diameter of 1-1.6 m (3-5 ft). White pine forests originally covered much of northeastern North America, though few of the original trees remain untouched by extensive logging operations in the 1700s and 1800s to harvest the valuable wood. One survivor is a specimen known as the "Boogerman Pine" in the Cataloochee Valley, Great Smoky Mountains National Park. This tree is, at 56.5 m (185 ft) tall, the tallest tree in North America east of the Rocky Mountains. Before it lost its top in Hurricane Opal in October 1995, it was 63 m (207 ft) tall.
Because the tree is somewhat resistant to fire, mature survivors are able to re-seed burned areas. In pure stands the trees usually have no branches on the lower half of the trunk. In mixed forests, this dominant tree towers over all others, including the large hardwoods. It provides food and shelter for forest birds such as the Common Crossbill and small mammals such as squirrels. The White Pine Weevil (Pissodes strobi) and White Pine Blister Rust (Cronartium ribicola), an introduced fungus, can damage or kill these trees.
During the age of sail, the tall trees with their high quality wood were valued for masts, and many trees were marked in colonial times with the broad arrow, reserving them for the British Royal Navy. An unusual large, lone, white pine was found in colonial times, in coastal South Carolina along the Black River (far south of its normal range), and the king's mark was put upon this particular tree, giving rise to the town, Kingstree. The wood was often squared immediately after felling to fit in the holds of ships better.
Eastern White Pine is now widely grown in plantation forestry within its native area. Several cultivars have been developed for garden use, many of them dwarf with very slow growth. The species was imported into England by Captain George Weymouth in 1620, who planted it widely for a future timber crop, but with little success due to White Pine Blister Rust disease.
Eastern White Pine is the Provincial tree of Ontario and the State tree of Maine and Michigan and it's "pine cone and tassel" is the "state flower" of Maine. It is also occasionally known as White Pine, Northern White Pine, or Soft Pine. It is also known as Weymouth Pine, especially in Britain. In addition, this tree is known to the Haudenosaunee Native Americans as the Tree of Great Peace.
White Pine needles contain five times the amount of Vitamin C (by weight) of lemons, and make an excellent tea. The inner bark (cambium) is edible. It is also a source of resveratrol.
References and external links
- Conifer Specialist Group (1998). [Pinus strobus]. 2006 IUCN Red List of Threatened Species. IUCN 2006. Retrieved on 12 May 2006.
- [Gymnosperm Database: Pinus strobus]
- [Arboretum de Villardebelle - cone photo]
- [Eastern Native Tree Society - Boogerman Pine photo gallery]
- [The Monday Garden: The Eastern White Pine]
- [Pinus strobus images at bioimages.vanderbilt.edu]
- [Netstate.com Maine State Flower]
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