red spruce
Picea rubens
Red spruce wood is highly prized for making musical instruments, especially acoustic guitars and violins, due to its exceptional resonance.
- Scientific name
- Picea rubens
- Taxonomy
- Plantae › Tracheophyta › Pinopsida › Pinales › Pinaceae › Picea
- IUCN Red List status
- Least Concern
- Population trend
- stable
- Biome
- forest
- Habitat
- Montane and subalpine coniferous and mixed forests, thriving in cool, moist, rocky soils.
- Diet
- Autotrophic (photosynthesis utilizing sunlight, water, and carbon dioxide)
- Range
- Eastern North America, Appalachian Mountains, Adirondack Mountains, New England, Eastern Canada
- Size
- 18 to 30 meters (60 to 100 feet) tall, trunk diameter up to 60 cm
- Lifespan
- 250 to 400 years
- Active
- diurnal
- Threats
- Acid deposition, climate change shifting its thermal range, logging, and pests like the spruce budworm.
- Safe to approach?
- Harmless. Feel free to touch its rough, reddish-brown bark or gently smell its aromatic, citrus-scented needles. Ensure you do not damage its roots or peel its bark, as this exposes the tree to pests and pathogens.
Picea rubens , commonly known as red spruce , is a species of spruce native to eastern North America, ranging from eastern Quebec to Nova Scotia, and from New England south in the Adirondack Mountains and Appalachians to western North Carolina.
Photo: Douglas Goldman, CC-BY-SA, via iNaturalist
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