I’m going to try to describe some of the different types of conifers that one is likely to encounter around the Holiday season, either in the form of Christmas trees, or cones being used as decoration or as planted or wild individuals you may see.

Pine vs. Fir vs. Spruce

There are several different types of trees that have, for whatever reason, been deemed by western society as acceptable icons of the holiday season. These species fall into three different genera: the Pines (genus Pinus) the Firs (genus Abies) and the Spruces (genus Picea). As with any plant, the best way to distinguish them is by looking at the reproductive structures (in this case, the cones) but since we are talking about Christmas trees, it’s unlikely that they will have cones (I counted the tree rings on my brother’s Frasier Fir and it was 10 years old, 5 years short of reproductive age for that species) so we will have to resort to other features.

Pines are the most distinctive of these genera based on their leaf arrangement, so you should be able to pick these out with no problem. Pine trees have long needles that are bundled together onto a short woody bit so that if you pull a needle off of a branch it will come with one or more other needles as well as little woody connector at the base (together this collection is called a fascicle). In contrast, Firs and Spruces have needles that come off of the stems one at a time, not in bundles.

Abies fraseri (Fraser Fir) with leaves attached to the stem by small, flat pads. Photo by me from the ROM herbarium (TRT)

To tell the difference between a Fir and a Spruce, you have to look at what remains on the stems after the needles come off: Firs stems will be smooth with circular scars where the leaves used to be attached, while Spruces will have many small woody pegs all over them, creating a rough texture. I actually get these two mixed up a lot, so I just came up with a little memory helper:

“Spruce up your Fir rug”

Where “up” reminds you that spruces have raised bumps and “rug” reminds you that Firs have flat leaf scars. It’s dumb enough that it just might work!

If you can’t find these characters (needles in bundles, round flat leaf scars or bumpy pegs) then it could very well be that you are looking at a plant that is neither Pine, Fir nor Spruce, in which case you’ll have to do some more sleuthing! Try your hand at a wonderful identification resource by the New England Wildflower Society over here.

Different Kinds of Cones

In case you do come across some conifer cones (or, botanical speaking, strobili) there are some key things that you can look for to tell you what kind of tree it came from. The first is: are you sure that this thing that kind of looks like a berry isn’t actually a cone? Keep in mind that one of the purposes of a cone is to disperse the seeds, because if they simply fall to the ground, they are likely to be in the shade of their mom. Most conifers accomplish seed dispersal by having seeds in the shape of a light, papery wing that can fly like a helicopter in the wind. However, two groups (Yews [genus Taxus] and Junipers [genus Juniperus]) evolved a different strategy: they encase their seeds in colourful, fleshy, sugar-filled cones that attract birds. The birds eat these “berries”, fly away and the seeds pass through their digestive system and out with the droppings into a new home. Also, Juniper cones (or Juni-berries, as I used to call them) are used to make Gin! But that’s another story.

Now, assuming that you have a woody cone (and are not dealing with a Yew or a Juniper), take a look at the pattern formed by the woody scales. Are the scales overlapping like shingles on a roof? Or are they more like tiles with only the edges touching? The former type of cone probably belongs to a plant in the Pinaceae (pine-AY-see-ay) or the Pine family, so it could be a Cedar, Hemlock, Spruce, Pine, Fir or Larch. The later type of cone probably comes from a plant in the Cupressaceae (cue-press-AY-see-ay) and could be a Cypress or Redcedar. If all you have is a cone, then getting any closer to naming the species it came from is going to be a little tricky, so you might want to ask you friendly neighbourhood botanist for help.

Now, go armed with your new knowledge of variation in conifer morphology. Explore the holiday wilderness landscape and investigate which of your family members ended up with which type of Christmas tree and which kinds of cones as decoration. Even if you have fake, plastic imitations of trees or cones to look at, it is a fun bonus challenge to try to guess what the creator of the artificial object was trying to base its shape on. And if you find decorative cones that don’t match the plant they have been glued to… please let me know straight away, I’ll be over shortly with my PowerPoint slides.