Pinus longaeva
Pinus sabiniana
bristlecone pine, Great Basin bristlecone pine, intermountain bristlecone pine
California foothill pine, digger pine, foothill pine, ghost, gray, gray pine, or foothill pine
red-brown, shallowly to deeply fissured with thick, scaly, irregular, blocky ridges.
dark brown to near black, irregularly and deeply furrowed, ridges irregularly rectangular or blocky, scaly, often breaking away, bases of furrows and underbark orangish.
contorted, pendent;
twigs pale red-brown, aging gray to yellow-gray, puberulent, young branches resembling long bottlebrushes because of persistent leaves.
often ascending;
cone-bearing branchlets stout, twigs comparatively slender, both pale purple-brown and glaucous, aging gray, rough.
ovoid-acuminate, pale red-brown, ca. 1cm, resinous.
ovoid, red-brown, ca. 1cm, resinous;
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.
mostly 3 per fascicle, drooping, persisting 3–4 years, 15–32cm × 1.5mm, slightly twisted, dull blue-green, all surfaces with pale, narrow stomatal lines, margins serrulate, apex short-acuminate;
sheath to 2.4cm, base persistent.
cylindro-ellipsoid, 7–10mm, purple-red.
ellipsoid, 10–15mm, 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, persisting to 7 years, pendent, massive, heavy, nearly symmetric, ovoid before opening, broadly to narrowly ovoid or ovoid-cylindric when open, 15–25cm, dull brown, resinous, stalks to 5cm;
apophyses elongate, curved, continuous with umbos to form long, upcurved claws to 2cm.
= 24.
Pinus longaeva
Pinus sabiniana
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.)
Seeds of Pinus sabiniana were an important food source for many Indian groups in California, sometimes collectively referred to as "Digger Indians." Because the name "Digger" has been used as a derogatory ethnic term, many people prefer to avoid using the vernacular name Digger pine.
(Discussion copyrighted by Flora of North America; reprinted with permission.)
CA
WildflowerSearch
iNaturalist
USDA Plants Database
OR
Flora NW
PNW Herbaria
