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| ## white spruce {#white-spruce .Title-Header}                         |
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| *Picea glauca* (Moench) Voss                                          |
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| Plant Symbol = PIGL                                                   |
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Contributed by: USDA NRCS National Plant Data Center & the Biota of
North America Program

### ![](media/image2.jpeg){width="2.6972222222222224in" height="1.8340277777777778in"}

## Alternate Names 

Canada spruce, skunk spruce, cat spruce, single spruce, western white
spruce (var. *albertiana*, Canadian Rocky Mts.), Porsild spruce (var.
*porsildii*, Alaska), Black Hills spruce (var. *densata*, South Dakota);
synonyms: *Picea alba* (Aiton) Link; *Picea canadensis* (Miller) B.S.P.

## Uses

The wood of white spruce is used primarily for pulpwood and lumber for
various construction, prefab houses, mobile homes, furniture, boxes and
crates, and pallets. It also is used for house logs, musical
instruments, and paddles. Because of its wide geographic range and
abundance, it is (de facto) highly significant for food and cover of
many wildlife species, for soil stability, watershed value, and
recreation. It was historically important for food, shelter, medicine,
fuel, and other uses by American Indians. White spruce is the provincial
tree of Manitoba and the state tree of South Dakota. White spruce is
much used in some areas for Christmas trees and is a good ornamental and
shade tree.

## Status

Please consult the PLANTS Web site and your State Department of Natural
Resources for this plant's current status, such as, state noxious status
and wetland indicator values.

## Description 

*General*: Pine Family (Pinaceae). Native trees grows to 25 (-50) meters
tall, the crown broadly conic to spire-like, or the plants sometimes
shrub-like near treeline; branches slightly drooping; twigs not pendent,
slender, pinkish-brown, without hairs. Bark is gray-brown, thin scaly.
Needles are evergreen, borne singly from all sides of the twig but often
crowded on the upper side, (0.8-) 1.5-2 (-2.5) cm long, blue-green,
4-angled, often inwardly curved, stiff, sharp-pointed. Seed cones are
light brown at maturity, 2.5-6 (-8) cm long, ellipsoid, pendent; cone
scales fan-shaped, soft and flexible, the tip smooth-edged and extending
0.5-3 mm beyond seed-wing impression. The common name is derived from
the white waxy layer on the foliage.

*Variation within the species*: White spruce is highly variable over its
range and several varieties (apart from the typical) have sometimes been
recognized.

*P. glauca* var. *albertiana* (S. Brown) Sargent -- Canadian Rocky
Mountains

*P. glauca* var. *densata* Bailey -- Black Hills of South Dakota and
adjacent Wyoming

*P. glauca* var. *porsildii* Raup -- Alaska

The diagnostic characteristics of these variants are not well correlated
and occur rather sporadically -- some of the features may reflect
interspecific hybridization and some may be phenotypic modifications.
More study is needed, but recent taxonomic treatments do not formally
recognize variants within white spruce. Most of the variation follows
gradients of latitude and altitude.

Where they occur together, white spruce and Engelmann spruce regularly
hybridize and intergrade completely, the hybrids occurring in
intermediate elevation. Such trees are largely the basis for the
description of *P. glauca* var. *albertiana*. White spruce also forms
natural hybrids with Sitka spruce and black spruce.

## Distribution

Widespread across northern North America, from Alaska, Yukon, and
British Columbia continuously eastward to Nova Scotia, Newfoundland, New
Brunswick, and Québec, in the northeastern United States and
sporadically in the northern tier of states (Montana, Wyoming, South
Dakota, Minnesota, Wisconsin, Michigan). For current distribution,
please consult the Plant Profile page for this species on the PLANTS Web
site.

## Establishment

*Adaptation*: In muskegs, bogs, and river banks, to montane slopes; at
0-1000 (-2100) meters elevation. White spruce is a dominant tree of
interior forests in Canada and Alaska and often an early colonizer in
succession. White spruce co-occurs with black spruce (*Picea mariana*)
over a wide range -- the two species have evolved a complex competitive
relationship (habitat partitioning) involving contrasts in water
tolerance, vegetative reproduction, flowering times, and rate of early
growth. *Picea glauca* grows best on well-drained mineral soils with
deep or no permafrost, while *P. mariana* is more tolerant of sites with
flooding, permafrost, and high soil acidity.

*Planting*: Cone crops have been reported for trees as young as 4 years,
but seed production in quantity begins at age 30 or older for most
natural stands. Good years of seed production may be 2-12 years apart.

Germination under established or mature stands commonly occurs on a
variety of seedbeds -- particularly on rotted logs and moss beds, but
exposed mineral soil after windthrow and floods is the best seedbed.
Large numbers of white spruce may become established immediately
following disturbance. Seedling growth is greatest at full light
intensity, but white spruce is capable of reproducing under mature
stands of spruce and early succession tree species. Because seedling and
juvenile growth of white spruce is slower than its early successional
associates, it remains in the understory for 50 to 70 years.

Trees 100-250 years old are common on good sites; older trees (250 to
300 years) are frequently found in areas protected from fire and in
relatively wet upland situations. As in other species, maximum age
appears to occur on stress sites at latitudinal or elevational treeline.
Trees 500-1000 years old are known from such sites.

## Management

White spruce trees from very young to 200 or more years may show good
growth after release resulting from natural causes or silvicultural
treatment.

Mature forests with white spruce are easily destroyed because of their
high susceptibility to fire. The probability of elimination of this
species increases with latitude because good seed years become
infrequent and seed quality poorer. At relatively short fire intervals
(less than 40-50 years), the source of white spruce seed can be
eliminated.

Delivery of seeds to seedbeds for germination may limit regeneration.
Squirrels may harvest as much as 90 percent of the cone crop in Alaska.
Seed predation by insects and small mammals such as deer mice,
red-backed and meadow voles, chipmunks, and shrews also can result in
significant seed loss.

Slow initial root growth makes young seedlings and transplants
particularly susceptible to frost heaving. The severity of damage
generally is greatest on fine-textured and wet soils where water is
adequate for ice crystal formation in the surface soil. Defoliation by
the spruce budworm and the western spruce budworm can cause mortality if
defoliation continues for 2 or more years.

## Cultivars, Improved and Selected Materials (and area of origin)

These plant materials are readily available from commercial sources. The
cultivar 'Conica' (dwarf Alberta spruce, or dwarf white spruce) "is
probably the best-known and most widely sold dwarf conifer in the United
States (Dirr 1997)."

Contact your local Natural Resources Conservation Service (formerly Soil
Conservation Service) office for more information. Look in the phone
book under "United States Government." The Natural Resources
Conservation Service will be listed under the subheading "Department of
Agriculture."

## References

Daubenmire, R. 1974. *Taxonomic and ecologic relationships between Picea
glauca and Picea engelmannii*. Canad. J. Bot. 52:1545-1560.

Dirr, M.A. 1997. *Dirr\'s hardy trees and shrubs: An illustrated
encyclopedia*. Timber Press, Portland, Oregon.

LaRoi, G.H. & J.R. Dugle 1968. *A systematic and genecological study of
Picea glauca and P. engelmannii, using paper chromatography of needle
extracts*. Canad. J. Bot. 46:649-687.

Little, E.L., Jr. & S.S. Pauley 1958. *A natural hybrid between black
and white spruce in Minnesota*. Amer. Midl. Naturalist 60:202-211.

Naturhistoriska riksmuseet 1999. *Picea glauca*. IN: *Den viruella
floren*. Stockholm, Sweden.

\<http://linnaeus.nrm.se/flora/barr/pina/picea/picegla.html\>

Nienstaedt, H. & J.C. Zasada 1990. *Picea glauca*. Pp. 204-226, IN R.M.
Burns and B.H. Honkala. *Silvics of North America*. *Volume 1.*
*Conifers*. USDA Forest Service Agric. Handbook 654, Washington, D.C.
\<http://willow.ncfes.umn.edu/silvics_manual/Table_of_contents.htm\>

Taylor, R.J. 1993. *Picea*. Pp. 369-373, IN: *Flora of North America,
north of Mexico*. Vol. 2, *Pteridophytes and gymnosperms*. Oxford Univ.
Press, New York.
\<http://hua.huh.harvard.edu/cgi-bin/Flora/flora.pl?FLORA_ID=12395\>

## Prepared By

*Guy Nesom*

Formerly BONAP, North Carolina Botanical Garden, University of North
Carolina, Chapel Hill, North Carolina

## Species Coordinator

### *Gerald Guala*

USDA, NRCS, National Plant Data Center, Baton Rouge, Louisiana

Edited 05dec00; 13feb03 ahv; 060802 jsp

For more information about this and other plants, please contact your
local NRCS field office or Conservation District, and visit the PLANTS
Web site\<[http://plants.usda.gov](http://plants.usda.gov/)\> or the
Plant Materials Program Web site
\<[http://Plant-Materials.nrcs.usda.gov](http://Plant-Materials.nrcs.usda.gov/)\>

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*To file a complaint of discrimination write USDA, Director, Office of
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