# red spruce

*Picea rubens*

Red spruce wood is highly prized for making musical instruments, especially acoustic guitars and violins, due to its exceptional resonance.

- **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.

## About

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.

## Sources

- Plate: https://gaia-dex.com/species/7895c043-9ca5-4b4e-aff2-f9a03bc2d1c0
- iNaturalist: https://www.inaturalist.org/taxa/121931
- Wikipedia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Picea rubens
- Conservation status: IUCN Red List category, as recorded by Gaia-Dex
- Photo: https://inaturalist-open-data.s3.amazonaws.com/photos/271649059/medium.jpg (Douglas Goldman, CC-BY-SA, via iNaturalist)

Habitat, diet, size and similar notes are AI-written summaries; check them against the linked sources before relying on them.