Description
Picea – Spruce –
There are 30-45 species of monoecious, evergreen, coniferous trees in the Pinaceae family, in this genus. They are stiff, narrow, conical, sometimes columnar trees. They occur in forest in cool temperate regions of the Northern Hemisphere. They have horizontal to upward pointing branches covered in needle like leaves set singly around the shoots, and varies from bright green, glaucous, blue, silver and gray. The woody, oval to oblong-cylindrical female cones, held terminal on main shoots and side shoots, are erect at flowering, later pendent, they ripen in a season from green or red when young to purple or brown when mature. Ovoid, yellow to red purple male cones, 3/4-1 1/4″ long, are borne in spring on previous years shoots. Spruces are useful for shelter planting or as specimen trees, many cultivars are dwarf or slow growing. There are prostrate cultivars that make excellent ground covers.
Grow in any deep, moist but well drained, ideally neutral to acidic soil in full sun. It will not withstand polluted environments.
Prone to gall insects, aphids, caterpillars, sawfly, red spider mites, lesion nematode, scale insects, butt rot, heart rot, witches broom, mistletoe, rust, gall adelgids, and needle cast.
P. abies – Common Spruce – Norway Spruce – This slow growing conical tree when young later columnar from Southern Scandinavia to Central and Southern Europe grows 70-140′ feet tall and 20′ feet wide. It has a straight orange brown bark that matures to reddish, which sheds in scales. It produces blunt, 4-sided, dark green leaves, to 1″ long, pointing forward and upward on the shoots, and cigar shaped, erect, deep green, later brown, pendent female cones 4-8″ long. The most commonly spruce-traditional X-mas tree in Europe.
‘Nidiformis’ – ‘Bird’s-nest Spruce – is a spreading, slow growing to 5′ feet tall and 10-12′ feet wide, bushy shrub with a hollow “nest” in the center and has bright green leaves.
Zones 3-8
