Red Spruce Tree Information
Images of Red Spruce:
Red Spruce grows in the following 16 states and provinces:
Connecticut, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, New Brunswick, New Hampshire, New Jersey, New York, North Carolina, Nova Scotia, Pennsylvania, Prince Edward Island, Tennessee, Vermont, Virginia, West VirginiaInformation about Red Spruce:
The Picea Rubens is commonly known as the Blue Spruce, Eastern Spruce, He-balsam, Red Spruce, West Virginia Spruce as well as Yellow Spruce.
The accepted scientific name for red spruce is Picea rubens Sarg. There are no subspecies, varieties, or forms . Natural hybrids with black spruce (P. mariana) have been reported .Red spruce occurs from Cape Breton Island, Nova Scotia, and New Brunswick, west to Maine, southern Quebec, and southeastern Ontario, and south to central New York, northeastern Pennsylvania, northern New Jersey, and northeastern Massachusetts. Its range extends south in the Appalachian Mountains of extreme western Maryland, eastern West Virginia, northern and western Virginia, western North Carolina, and eastern Tennessee .Red spruce is a common dominant or codominant in the red spruce and the spruce-fir forests of the northeastern United States and adjacent Canada. Shrub associates of red spruce in the Adirondack Mountains of New York include red raspberry (Rubus idaeus), dwarfed blackberry (R. pubescens), hobblebush (Viburnum alnifolium), Canada yew (Taxus canadensis), and American fly honeysuckle (Lonicera canadensis). Ground layer herbs include wild sarsaparilla (Aralia nudicaulis), Aster acuminatus, yellow beadlily (Clintonia borealis), and common wood-sorrel (Oxalis montana). Common bryophytes found in old-growth red spruce forests in the Adirondacks include Brotherella recurvans, Schreber's moss (Pleurozium schreberi), Polytrichum ohioense, mountain fern moss (Hylocomium splendens), Bazzania trilobata, ptilium (Ptilium crista-castrensis), Drepanocladus uncinatus, Dicranum scoparium, and D. montanum . In the southern Appalachian Mountains, arboreal associates include Fraser fir (Abies fraseri), yellow buckeye (Aesculus octandra), sweet birch (Betula lenta), and black cherry (Prunus serotina) in addition to those found in the northern part of its range . Understory associates in openings include rhododendrons (Rhododendron spp.), American mountain-ash (Sorbus americana), and wild raisin (Viburnum cassinoides). Other understory associates include highbush cranberry (Viburnum edule), mountain holly (Ilex montana), mountain laurel (Kalmia latifolia), speckled alder (Alnus rugosa), pin cherry (Prunus pensylvanica), serviceberry (Amelanchier spp.), raspberries (Rubus spp.), and blueberries and huckleberries (Vaccinium spp.). In closed red spruce stands, mosses, lichens, and clubmosses predominate in the understory along with wood sorrel (Oxalis spp.), trillium (Trillium spp.), and checkerberry wintergreen (Gaultheria procumbens) . Publications describing habitat or cover types in which red spruce is dominant or codominant include: (1) Proceedings of the Region 9 Land Systems conference on the White Mountain National Forest (2) The Hubbard Brook ecosystem study: composition and dynamics of the tree stratum (3) Ground vegetation patterns of the spruce-fir area of the Great Smoky Mountains National Park (4) Spruce-fir forests of the coast of Maine (5) Forest type studies in the Adirondack region (6) The classification and evaluation of site for forestry (7) The identification and description of forest sites (8) Old-growth forests of Adirondack Park, New York (9) Vegetation-environment relationships in virgin, middle elevation forests in the Adirondack Mountains, New York (10) Natural ecological communities of New York State Some of the information provided here is attributed to:Sullivan, Janet. 1993. Picea rubens. In: Fire Effects Information System, [Online]. U.S. Department of Agriculture, Forest Service, Rocky Mountain Research Station, Fire Sciences Laboratory (Producer). , available at the USDA Fire Effects Information System (FEIS) website