Pinus longaeva
Pinus radiata
bristlecone pine, Great Basin bristlecone pine, intermountain bristlecone pine
insignis pine, Monterey pine
red-brown, shallowly to deeply fissured with thick, scaly, irregular, blocky ridges.
gray, deeply V-furrowed, furrow bases red, ridges irregularly elongate-rectangular, their flattened surfaces scaly.
contorted, pendent;
twigs pale red-brown, aging gray to yellow-gray, puberulent, young branches resembling long bottlebrushes because of persistent leaves.
level to downcurved or ascending, poorly self-pruning;
twigs slender, red-brown, sometimes glaucous, aging gray, rough.
ovoid-acuminate, pale red-brown, ca. 1cm, resinous.
ovoid to ovoid-cylindric, red-brown, ca. 1.5cm, resinous.
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–)3 in a fascicle, spreading-ascending, persisting 3–4 years, (8–)9–15(–20)cm × 1.3–1.8(–2)mm, straight, slightly twisted, deep yellow-green, all surfaces with fine stomatal lines, margins serrulate, apex conic-subulate;
sheath (1–)1.5–2cm, base persistent.
cylindro-ellipsoid, 7–10mm, purple-red.
ellipsoid-cylindric, 10–15mm, orange-brown.
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, but often serotinous and persistent 6–20 years, solitary to whorled, spreading to recurved, curved, very asymmetric, ovoid before opening, broadly ovoid when open, 7–14cm, pale red-brown and lustrous, scales rigid, stalks to 1cm;
apophyses toward outer cone base increasingly mammillate, those on inward cone side and middle and apex of cone more level;
umbo central, mostly depressed, with small central boss or occasionally with slender, deciduous prickle.
=24.
Pinus longaeva
Pinus radiata
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.)
Pinus radiata has an extremely narrow natural range: three coastal areas in California (one in San Mateo and Santa Cruz counties, one in Monterey County, and one in San Luis Obispo County) and off the coast of Baja California, Mexico (Guadalupe Island and debatably also on Cedros Island). Some natural populations of the species are under protection. Along the California coast it has escaped from cultivation, and from there into southern coastal Oregon it shows signs of naturalizing.
Pinus radiata is a much better-formed tree and of greater silvicultural value within its introduced range (Africa, Australia, Europe, and New Zealand, where it is a principal timber tree) than in its native range. It hybridizes naturally with P. attenuata (P. × attenuiradiata Stockwell & Righter).
Of conservation concern.
(Discussion copyrighted by Flora of North America; reprinted with permission.)
CA
WildflowerSearch
iNaturalist
USDA Plants Database
