Conifer Trees Database

Description. Pitch pine is an evergreen coniferous species of tree that grows to mature heights of 100 feet (31 m); with a straight or crooked trunk up to 36 inches (0.9 m) in diameter, measured at breast height, commonly with adventitious sprouts; crown rounded or irregular.

• Bark is red-brown, deeply and irregularly furrowed, with long, irregularly rectangular, flat, scaly ridges, and absent resin pockets.
• Branches are arching-spreading to ascending, and poorly self-pruning. Two-year-old branchlets are stout, mostly over 0.2 inch (5 mm) thick, colored orange-brown, aging rough, and darker brown.
• Foliar buds are ovoid to ovoid-cylindrically shaped, resinous, colored red-brown, measuring circa 0.4 to 0.6 inch (1 - 1.5 cm); with fringed scale margins and cuspidate apices.
• Leaves (needles) are borne 3 (sometimes up to 5) per fascicle, oriented spreading to ascending, persisting 2 to 3 years on the tree. Individual needles measure 2 to 4 inches (5 - 10 cm) by 0.04 to 0.06 inch (1 - 1.5 mm); and grow straight to twisted, colored deep to pale yellow-green. All surfaces bear fine lines of stomata, serrulate margins, and abruptly subulate-acuminate apices.
• Foliar sheaths measure 0.36 to 0.48 inch (0.9 - 1.2 cm), with a persistent base.
• Pollen cones are cylindrical, and yellow in color, measuring circa (0.8 inch (20 mm).
• Seed cones mature 2 years after pollination, shedding seeds soon thereafter or are variably serotinous and long-persistent. They often grow clustered, symmetrically conic to ovoid before opening, broadly ovoid with a flat or slightly convex base when open, measuring 1.2 to 3.6 inches (3 - 9 cm) long, creamy brown to light red-brown in color, sessile to short-stalked, with a truncate base.
• Seed scales are firm, with a dark red-brown border on distal adaxial surfaces. Apophyses are slightly raised, with a rhombic outline, and strong transverse keels. Umbos are centrally oriented, shaped low-triangular, with a slender, downcurved prickle.
• Seeds are broadly obliquely obovoid-deltoid shaped; with a 0.16 to 0.2 inch (4 - 5 mm) body, colored dark brown, mottled darker, to near black with an attached wing 0.6 to 0.8 inch (15 - 20 mm) long.

Distribution. This species is native to Canada - Ontario and Québec; south through USA - Maine, New Hampshire, Vermont, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, Connecticut, New York, New Jersey, Delaware, Pennsylvania, Maryland, Ohio, Virginia, West Virginia, Kentucky, Tennessee, North Carolina, South Carolina and Georgia; growing on upland or lowland sites on sterile, dry to boggy soils; at elevations from sea level to 4,800 feet (1,400 m).

Hardy to USDA Zone 4 - cold hardiness limit between -30° to -20°F (-34.3°C and -28.9°C).