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Picea mariana
Also called Bog Spruce, Swamp Spruce, Shortleaf Black Spruce
Black spruce is a slow-growing, small evergreen conifer native to the boreal forests of Canada, Alaska and the northern US, usually grown outdoors in cold climates or in bogs. It is a genus-level note only in that this entry covers the species; its key to growing it is cold hardiness and moist, acidic, poorly drained soil.
Picea mariana, the black spruce, is a North American species of spruce tree in the pine family. It is widespread across Canada, found in all 10 provinces and all 3 territories. It is the official tree of Newfoundland and Labrador and is that province's most abundant tree. Its range extends into northern parts of the United States: in Alaska, the Great Lakes region, and the upper Northeast. It is a frequent part of the biome known as taiga or boreal forest.
The Latin specific epithet mariana means "of the Virgin Mary".
Numerous cultivars have been selected for use in parks and gardens. The cultivar P. mariana 'Nana' is a dwarf form which has gained the Royal Horticultural Society's Award of Garden Merit. Picea mariana is known to hybridize with Serbian spruce, Picea omorika. The hybrid is Picea machala, and hybrids with Sitka spruce are known as well.
Growth varies with site quality. In swamp and muskeg it shows progressively slower growth rates from the edges toward the centre. The roots are shallow and wide spreading, resulting in susceptibility to windthrow. In the northern part of its range, ice pruned asymmetric black spruce are often seen with diminished foliage on the windward side. Tilted trees colloquially called "drunken trees" are associated with thawing of permafrost.
Black spruce is the provincial tree of Newfoundland and Labrador. The timber is of low value due to the small size of the trees, but it is an important source of pulpwood and the primary source of it in Canada. Fast-food chopsticks are often made from black spruce. It is increasingly being used for making cross laminated timber by companies such as Nordic Structures, which allows the high strength due to the tight growth rings to be assembled into larger timbers. Along with red spruce, it has also been used to make spruce gum and spruce beer.
Norway Spruce · Brewer's Spruce · White Spruce · Jezo Spruce · Serbian Spruce · Caucasian Spruce · Blue spruce · Schrenk's Spruce · Spruce
Text excerpted from the Wikipedia article Picea mariana by its contributors, under CC BY-SA 4.0; the excerpts and the care summary drawn from them are shared under the same licence.
The care summary was written by AI (Claude, Anthropic) from the sources on this page, with general growing knowledge where they are silent. Check before relying on it.
Life form, climate and native range: World Checklist of Vascular Plants, Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew (CC BY 3.0), reformatted; see Plants of the World Online.
