Picea Parryana Sarg.
Leaves strongly incurved, especially those on the upper side of the branches, stout, rigid, acuminate and tipped with long callous sharp points, 1′—1⅛′ long on sterile branches, often not more than half as long on the fertile branches of old trees, marked on each side by 4—7 rows of stomata, dull bluish green on some individuals and light or dark steel-blue or silvery white on others, the blue colors gradually changing to dull blue-green at the end of three or four years. Flowers: male yellow tinged with red; female with broad oblong or slightly obovate pale green scales truncate or slightly emarginate at the denticulate apex, and acute bracts. Fruit produced on the upper third of the tree, sessile or short-stalked, oblong-cylindric, slightly narrowed at the ends, usually about 3′ long, green more or less tinged with red when fully grown at midsummer, becoming pale chestnut-brown and lustrous, with flat tough rhombic scales flexuose on the margins, and acute, rounded or truncate at the elongated erose apex; seeds ⅛′ long or about half the length of their wings, gradually widening to above the middle and full and rounded at apex.
A tree, usually 80°—100° or occasionally 150° high, with a trunk rarely 3° in diameter and occasionally divided into 3 or 4 stout secondary stems, rigid horizontal branches disposed on young trees in remote whorls and decreasing regularly in length from below upward, the short stout stiff branchlets pointing forward and making flat-topped masses of foliage; branches on old trees short and remote, with stout lateral branches forming a thin ragged pyramidal crown; branchlets stout, rigid, glabrous, pale glaucous green, becoming bright orange-brown during the first winter and ultimately light grayish brown. Winter-buds stout, obtuse or rarely acute, ¼′—½′ long, with thin pale chestnut-brown scales usually reflexed on the margins. Bark of young trees gray or gray tinged with cinnamon-red and broken into small oblong plate-like scales, becoming on the lower part of old trunks ¾′—1½′ thick and deeply divided into broad rounded ridges covered with small closely appressed pale gray or occasionally bright cinnamon-red scales. Wood light, soft, close-grained, weak, pale brown or often nearly white, with hardly distinguishable sapwood.
Distribution. Banks of streams or on the first benches above them singly or in small groves at elevations between 6500° and 11,000° above the sea; Colorado and eastern Utah northward to the northern end of the Medicine Bow Mountains and on the Laramie Range in southern and on the Shoshone and Teton Mountains in northwestern Wyoming, and southward into northern New Mexico (Sierra Bianca, alt. 8000°—11,000°, Sacramento Mountains, Pecos River National Forest).
Often planted as an ornamental tree in the eastern and northern states and in western and northern Europe, especially individuals with blue foliage; very beautiful in early life but in cultivation soon becoming unsightly from the loss of the lower branches.
6. [Picea Breweriana] S. Wats. Weeping Spruce.
Leaves abruptly narrowed and obtuse at apex, straight or slightly incurved, rounded and obscurely ridged and dark green and lustrous on the lower surface, flattened and conspicuously marked on the upper surface by 4 or 5 rows of stomata on each side of the prominent midrib, ¾′—1⅛′ long, 1/16′—1/10′ wide. Flowers: male dark purple; female oblong-cylindric, with obovate scales rounded above and reflexed on the entire margins, and oblong bracts laciniately divided at their rounded or acute apex. Fruit ellipsoidal, gradually narrowed from the middle to the ends, acute at apex, rather oblique at base, suspended on straight slender stalks, deep rich purple or green more or less tinged with purple when fully grown, becoming light orange-brown, 2′—4′ long, with thin broadly ovate flat scales longer than broad, rounded at apex, opening late in the autumn after the escape of the seeds, often becoming strongly reflexed and very flexible; usually remaining on the branches until their second winter; seeds acute at base, full and rounded on the sides, ⅛′ long, dark brown, and about one quarter the length of their wings broadest toward the full and rounded apex.
A tree, usually 80°—100° high, with a trunk 2°—3° in diameter above the swelling of its enlarged and gradually tapering base, and furnished to the ground with crowded branches, those at the top of the tree short and slightly ascending, with comparatively short pendulous lateral branches, those lower on the tree horizontal or pendulous and clothed with slender flexible whip-like laterals often 7°—8° long and not more than ¼′ thick and furnished with numerous long thin lateral branchlets, their ultimate divisions slender, coated with fine pubescence persistent until their third season, bright red-brown during their first winter, gradually growing dark gray-brown. Winter-buds conic, light chestnut-brown, ¼′ long and ⅛′ thick. Bark ½′—¾′ thick, broken into long thin closely appressed scales dull red-brown on the surface. Wood heavy, soft, close-grained, light brown or nearly white, with thick hardly distinguishable sapwood.