What is the difference between a pine, fir, and spruce?
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Yellowdog (
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December 23rd, 2017
Most Christmas tree varieties fall in these three categories.
But I’ve noticed that the fragrance, branches and needles (not necessarily the overall form) of a Frayser Fir is very similar to a Norwegian spruce—and nothing like the Douglas fir which seems to be another type of tree altogether.
So what do Spruce, Fir, and Pine actually mean?
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2 Answers
I hope that this helps.
The Pine family (Pinaceae) includes pines, spruces and firs.
If you are a lumper then just call them all “pines”.
A splitter sees the huge multitude of pine species.
North America has at least 32 species of Pine including 7 species of spruce and 11 species of firs.
Douglas-Fir isn’t a true fir as it’s name implies “Pseudotsuga menziesii”. True firs generate their female cone sitting upright on the ends of their branches where as Douglas-Fir (and Bigcone Douglas-Fir) female cones point downward with their characteristic tridentate chaffy bracks.
Spruce is a diverse group. Some species have tiny female cones and that can be confusing. But generally the characteristic spruce female cone is scale like and elongated (some sort of resemble a huge cigar).
“Spruce and fir trees have their needles attached individually to the branches. To tell spruce and fir trees apart, it helps to know that spruce needles are sharply pointed, square and easy to roll between your fingers. Fir needles, on the other hand, are softer, flat and cannot be rolled between your fingers. On true pine trees, the needles are arranged and attached to the branches in clusters of two (red pine group), three (yellow pine group), or five (white pine group) needles per cluster.”
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