The Main Plant entry for Spruces (Picea)

There are about 30 to 40 species of this genus of conifers (Picea) in the Pine Family (Pinaceae). Spruces have rigid, from very prickly to soft and slightly prickly, evergreen needles that grow singly from persistent woody peg-like bases on the twigs. The pendant seed cones are made of papery to light woody scales, and the whole cone falls to the ground after releasing seed. The bark of spruces does not differ much among the species and is relatively thin and gray-brown to brown and scaly. The trees grow in a pyramidal habit from narrow to broad. These conifers are monoecious with both the pollinate (male) and seed (female) cones on the same tree, and usually the seed cones are towards the top of the tree. Spruces grow in the temperate parts of North America and Eurasia. Seven species are native to North America: the Black, Red, White, Engelman, Colorado, Sitka, and Brewer. Their habitat ranges from bogs, swamps, and along watercourses to up mountain slopes. Branch mutations have been propagated from various spruce species to create cultivars that are dwarf trees, bushes, or even groundcovers. They make good to high quality landscape plants.

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"A spruce is a tree of the genus Picea a genus of about 35 species of coniferous evergreen trees in the Family Pinaceae, found in the northern temperate and boreal (taiga) regions of the earth. Spruces are large trees, from 66–200 feet tall when mature, and can be distinguished by their whorled branches and conical form. The needles, or leaves, of spruce trees are attached singly to the branches in a spiral fashion, each needle on a small peg-like structure called a pulvinus. The needles are shed when 4–10 years old, leaving the branches rough with the retained pulvinus (an easy means of distinguishing them from other similar genera, where the branches are fairly smooth).

Spruces are used as food plants by the larvae of some Lepidoptera species; see list of Lepidoptera that feed on spruces. They are also used by the larvae of gall adelgids (Adelges species).

In the mountains of western Sweden scientists have found a Norway Spruce tree, nicknamed Old Tjikko, which by reproducing through layering has reached an age of 9,550 years and is claimed to be the world's oldest known living tree."

Taken from wikipedia's page at: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...

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