What is the difference between a pine, fir, and spruce?

What is the difference between a pine, fir, and spruce?
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1 Answer

Answer :

I hope that this helps. The Pine family (Pinaceae) includes pines, spruces and firs. If you are a lumper then just call them all “pines”. A splitter sees the huge multitude of pine species. North America has at least 32 species of Pine including 7 species of spruce and 11 species of firs. Douglas-Fir isn’t a true fir as it’s name implies “Pseudotsuga menziesii”. True firs generate their female cone sitting upright on the ends of their branches where as Douglas-Fir (and Bigcone Douglas-Fir) female cones point downward with their characteristic tridentate chaffy bracks. Spruce is a diverse group. Some species have tiny female cones and that can be confusing. But generally the characteristic spruce female cone is scale like and elongated (some sort of resemble a huge cigar).
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