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Picea glauca
Picea glauca, the white spruce, is a species of spruce native to the northern temperate and boreal forests in Canada and United States, North America.
Picea glauca is native from central Alaska all through the east, across western and southern/central Canada to the Avalon Peninsula in Newfoundland, Quebec, Ontario and south to Montana, North Dakota, Minnesota, Wisconsin, Michigan, Upstate New York and Vermont, along with the mountainous and immediate coastal portions of New Hampshire and Maine, where temperatures are just barely cool and moist enough to support it. There is also an isolated population in the Black Hills of South Dakota and Wyoming. It is also known as Canadian spruce, skunk spruce, cat spruce, Black Hills spruce, western white spruce, Alberta white spruce, and Porsild spruce.
The white spruce is a large evergreen conifer which normally grows to 15 to 30 metres (50 to 100 ft) tall, but can grow up to 41 m (133 ft) tall with a trunk diameter of up to 1 m (3 ft 3 in). The bark is thin and scaly, flaking off in small circular plates 5 to 10 centimetres (2 to 4 in) across. The crown is narrow – conical in young trees, becoming cylindrical in older trees. The shoots are pale buff-brown, glabrous in the east of the range, but often pubescent in the west, and with prominent pulvini. The leaves are needle-like, 12 to 25 millimetres (1⁄2 to 1 in) long, rhombic in cross-section, glaucous blue-green above (hence glauca) with several thin lines of stomata, and blue-white below with two broad bands of stomata.
The cones are pendulous, slender, cylindrical, 2.5 to 7 cm (1 to 2+3⁄4 in) long and 1.5 cm wide when closed, opening to 2.5 cm broad. They have thin, flexible scales 15 mm long with a smoothly rounded margin. They are green or reddish, maturing to pale brown 4 to 8 months after pollination. The seeds are black, 2 to 3 mm long, with a slender, tan wing 5 to 8 mm long.
Seeds are small, 2.5 to 5 mm long, oblong, and acute at the base. Determinations of the average number of sound seeds per white spruce cone have ranged from 32 to 130.
Common causes of empty seed are lack of pollination, abortion of the ovule, and insect damage.
The average weight per individual seed varies from 1.1 mg to 3.2 mg.
Each seed is clasped by a thin wing 2 to 4 times as long as the seed. Seed and wing are appressed to the cone scale. Embryo and megagametophyte are soft and translucent at first; later the endosperm becomes firm and milky white, while the embryo becomes cream-coloured or light yellow. At maturity, the testa darkens rapidly from light brown to dark brown or black. Mature seeds "snaps in two" when cut by a sharp knife on a firm surface.
Picea glauca
Picea glauca, the white spruce, is a species of spruce native to the northern temperate and boreal forests in Canada and United States, North America.
Picea glauca is native from central Alaska all through the east, across western and southern/central Canada to the Avalon Peninsula in Newfoundland, Quebec, Ontario and south to Montana, North Dakota, Minnesota, Wisconsin, Michigan, Upstate New York and Vermont, along with the mountainous and immediate coastal portions of New Hampshire and Maine, where temperatures are just barely cool and moist enough to support it. There is also an isolated population in the Black Hills of South Dakota and Wyoming. It is also known as Canadian spruce, skunk spruce, cat spruce, Black Hills spruce, western white spruce, Alberta white spruce, and Porsild spruce.
The white spruce is a large evergreen conifer which normally grows to 15 to 30 metres (50 to 100 ft) tall, but can grow up to 41 m (133 ft) tall with a trunk diameter of up to 1 m (3 ft 3 in). The bark is thin and scaly, flaking off in small circular plates 5 to 10 centimetres (2 to 4 in) across. The crown is narrow – conical in young trees, becoming cylindrical in older trees. The shoots are pale buff-brown, glabrous in the east of the range, but often pubescent in the west, and with prominent pulvini. The leaves are needle-like, 12 to 25 millimetres (1⁄2 to 1 in) long, rhombic in cross-section, glaucous blue-green above (hence glauca) with several thin lines of stomata, and blue-white below with two broad bands of stomata.
The cones are pendulous, slender, cylindrical, 2.5 to 7 cm (1 to 2+3⁄4 in) long and 1.5 cm wide when closed, opening to 2.5 cm broad. They have thin, flexible scales 15 mm long with a smoothly rounded margin. They are green or reddish, maturing to pale brown 4 to 8 months after pollination. The seeds are black, 2 to 3 mm long, with a slender, tan wing 5 to 8 mm long.
Seeds are small, 2.5 to 5 mm long, oblong, and acute at the base. Determinations of the average number of sound seeds per white spruce cone have ranged from 32 to 130.
Common causes of empty seed are lack of pollination, abortion of the ovule, and insect damage.
The average weight per individual seed varies from 1.1 mg to 3.2 mg.
Each seed is clasped by a thin wing 2 to 4 times as long as the seed. Seed and wing are appressed to the cone scale. Embryo and megagametophyte are soft and translucent at first; later the endosperm becomes firm and milky white, while the embryo becomes cream-coloured or light yellow. At maturity, the testa darkens rapidly from light brown to dark brown or black. Mature seeds "snaps in two" when cut by a sharp knife on a firm surface.
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