Pinus longaeva
Pinus clausa
bristlecone pine, Great Basin bristlecone pine, intermountain bristlecone pine
sand pine, scrub pine, spruce pine
red-brown, shallowly to deeply fissured with thick, scaly, irregular, blocky ridges.
gray to gray-brown, furrowed, with narrow, flat, irregular ridges, resin pockets absent, on upper sections of the trunk reddish to red-brown, platy becoming smooth distally.
contorted, pendent;
twigs pale red-brown, aging gray to yellow-gray, puberulent, young branches resembling long bottlebrushes because of persistent leaves.
spreading to ascending, poorly self-pruning;
twigs slender, violet- to red-brown, rarely glaucous, aging gray, smooth.
ovoid-acuminate, pale red-brown, ca. 1cm, resinous.
cylindric, purple-brown, to 1cm;
scale margins white-fringed.
mostly 5 per fascicle, upcurved, persisting 10–30 years, 1.5–3.5cm × 0.8–1.2mm, mostly connivent, deep yellow-green, with few resin splotches but often scurfy with pale scales, abaxial surface without median groove but with 2 subepidermal but evident resin bands, adaxial surfaces conspicuously whitened with stomates, margins entire or remotely and finely serrulate distally, apex bluntly acute to short-acuminate;
sheath ca. 1cm, soon forming rosette, shed early.
2 per fascicle, spreading-ascending, persisting 2–3 years, (3–)6–9(–10)cm × ca. 1mm, straight, slightly twisted, dark green, all surfaces with fine, inconspicuous stomatal lines, margins finely serrulate, apex short-conic;
sheath 0.3–0.5(–0.7)cm, base persistent.
cylindro-ellipsoid, 7–10mm, purple-red.
ellipsoid, ca. 10mm, brownish yellow.
cones maturing in 2 years, shedding seeds and falling soon thereafter, spreading, symmetric, lance-cylindric with rounded base before opening, lance-cylindric to narrowly ovoid when open, 6–9.5cm, purple, aging red-brown, nearly sessile;
apophyses much thickened, sharply keeled;
umbo central, raised on low buttress, truncate to umbilicate, abruptly narrowed to slender but stiff, variable prickle 1–6mm, resin exudate pale.
cones maturing in 2 years, shedding seeds soon thereafter or often long-serotinous, long-persistent, solitary or whorled, spreading, symmetric (rarely slightly asymmetric, reflexed), lanceoloid before opening, ovoid to broadly ovoid when open, 3–8cm, red-brown, sessile or on stalks to 1cm, scales with dark red-brown, purple, or purple-gray border distally on adaxial surface;
apophyses thickened, shallowly and angulately raised, transversely rhombic, cross-keeled;
umbo central, low-pyramidal, tapering to sharp tip or weak, often deciduous prickle.
=24.
Pinus longaeva
Pinus clausa
Pinus longaeva is considered by dendrochronologists to be the longest-lived tree. One tree was estimated to be 5000 years old.
(Discussion copyrighted by Flora of North America; reprinted with permission.)
Although Pinus clausa is too profusely branched to be important for saw timber, it is managed to produce a high volume of pulpwood in northern peninsular Florida.
(Discussion copyrighted by Flora of North America; reprinted with permission.)
CA
WildflowerSearch
iNaturalist
USDA Plants Database
