OUR MISSION: As our climate changes, ACER supports communities with grassroots initiatives to plant trees, and educates on how to measure, monitor and report on tree health and growth

Trees: White Spruce

Latin Name: Picea glauca

white spruce needles

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

General Description: Medium-sized trees, up to 25 m high, 60 cm in diameter and 200 years old.

Leaves: Straight, stiff, 15-22 mm long, tip pointed but not sharp, green to bluish-green, lines of white dots on all sides. Unpleasantly pungent when crushed.

White Spruce_leaves

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Twigs: Shiny, light greenish-gray, often tinged with orange or purple, hairless, leaf-cushions rounded, grooves open. Crown broadly conical, ragged, irregular, densely foliated, but spire-like in northern parts of the range.

Seed cones: Slender, cylindrical, 3-6 cm long, blunt-tipped, stalkless. Scales light brown, thin, tough, smooth. Cones open in late summer, seeds released from late summer to spring.

Sources used: Trees in Canada by John Laird Farrar (2006).