Pinus pungens |
|
---|---|
hickory pine, mountain pine, prickley pine, table mountain pine |
|
Habit | Trees to 12m; trunk to 0.6m diam., straight to crooked, erect to leaning, poorly self-pruning; crown irregularly rounded or flattened. |
Bark | red- to gray-brown, irregularly checked into scaly plates. |
Branches | horizontally spreading; twigs slender, orange- to yellow-brown, aging darker brown, rough. |
Buds | ovoid to cylindric, red-brown, 0.6–0.9cm, resinous. |
Leaves | 2(–3) per fascicle, spreading or ascending, persisting 3 years, 3–6(–8)cm × 1–1.5mm, twisted, deep yellow-green, all surfaces with fine stomatal lines, margins harshly serrulate, apex acute to short-acuminate; sheath 0.5–1cm, base persistent. |
Pollen cones | ellipsoid, ca. 15mm, yellow. |
Seed(s) | cones maturing in 2 years, variably serotinous, mostly whorled, downcurved, asymmetric, ovoid before opening, broadly ovoid when open, (4–)6–10cm, gray- to pale red-brown, nearly sessile or on stalks to 1cm; apophyses thickened, diamond-shaped, strongly keeled, elongate, mammillate at cone base abaxially; umbo central, a stout, curved, sharp claw. |
2n | =24. |
Pinus pungens |
|
Habitat | Dry, mostly sandy or shaly uplands, Appalachians and associated Piedmont |
Elevation | 500–1350m (1600–4400ft) |
Distribution |
DE; GA; MD; NC; NJ; PA; SC; TN; VA; WV
|
Discussion | Pinus pungens is a scrub pine and is too small and knotty to be much utilized except for pulpwood and firewood. Its common name refers to a general type of landform, not to a specific, named mountain. (Discussion copyrighted by Flora of North America; reprinted with permission.) |
Source | FNA vol. 2. |
Parent taxa | Pinaceae > Pinus |
Sibling taxa | |
Name authority | Lambert: Ann. Bot. (London) 2: 198. (1805) |
Web links |