Meet Longleaf Pine! graphix.com/pine.htm

I am Longleaf Pine. I live in the Coastal Plains from Virginia to Florida.

When early Europeans first explored the southeastern United States, they found a forest of longleaf pine trees covering about 90 million acres. These forests were seen in nine states, with Georgia, Alabama, and Florida having had the most longleaf pine. Today about 97% of this forest has been destroyed.

In the wild, I can grow up to 90 feet tall! I am considered a medium sized tree.

My bark is quite scaly, orange-brown to gray and deeply furrowed. Woodpeckers like to make holes in my bark as they dig for insects to eat.

My leaves are called needles and stay on all year. I am an evergreen tree.

My dark green needles are in bundles of three. They are " long. My needles are in tufts on the ends of branches.

I have male and female cones.

I won’t start producing cones until I’m 30 years old. My cones will contain about 35 seeds and the wind will send them everywhere!

My seeds will be dropped October to November. Then they germinate 1 to 2 weeks later.

First I have a “grass” stage. It lasts for 5 – 7 years.

Here are some longleaf pine seedlings at different stages of growth.

I have a large tap room that allows me to survive dry conditions and ground fires.

I am adapted to frequent low intensity fire. Older trees have an extremely flammable heartwood and sapwood covered by a relatively fire-resistant bark. Because of this, snags are rare.

The red-cockaded woodpecker makes its home in a living pine tree. Other woodpeckers live in snags.