Sugar Pines

Maybe it's crazy to love a tree, but that doesn't stop us. We have fallen in love with the Sugar Pine (Pinus lambertiana). On one of our walks a couple of weeks ago, we found a fantastically large pine cone, a true magnificent giant. I picked it up, took it home, googled "large pine cone" and immediately identified the species. According to Wikipedia the Sugar pine is notable for having the longest cones of any conifer, mostly 10-20 inches long (25-50cm). Soon after we found that one cone, we started to find more and then found the one tree along the path that was dropping them. I limited myself to taking home three cones.

In addition to having the longest pine cones, the Sugar Pine also is the largest species of pine. It grows 130-200 feet tall (40-60 meters). It's simply a beautiful giant in every way, with a fairly limited range, native to the pacific coast from Oregon through California to Baja.

The other day I noticed two people walking down the little dirt road on the south side of our property. I didn't recognize them at first, but shouted a hearty "hello" to them, so they headed over to the fence where I was standing. As they approached I saw that it was our neighbors who have had a family vacation home for over 40 years right up the hill from us. We had a nice little chat after wishing each other a happy new year and all of that. As luck would have it, they told me that they were out on a hunt for some sugar pines that they remembered from long ago growing down by our lower pond. We hardly ever go down to the lower pond. Two-thirds of it is on our other neighbor's property, and there's really not much of a trail to get there. But of course we were excited to learn that there might be some sugar pines right here in our backyard. But by then it was getting dark and cold, so the neighbors decided to forgo the search and chose instead to come inside and sit by our fire for a while and talk.
The next day, however, we couldn't wait to go looking for "our" sugar pines. We headed out toward the lower pond, walking through thick underbrush of young pines, berry vines, and young madrones. Roger spotted a pine cone on the ground and sure enough we found the tree just on the property boundary. We were so jazzed about it, like goofy giddy kids. We walked a bit further and found another pine cone from a second tree. I think we must have made up a Sugar Pine dance right there on the spot.

We do live in a pine forest that stretches for miles and miles. Right now we know where there are three Sugar Pines in all that vastness. We'll let you know when we find more! According to the article I linked to here, sugar pines rarely form pure stands and generally represents 5-25% of cover in mixed conifer associations.
PS: I took this ridiculous photo of myself holding these two cones. It's a crazy self-portrait with reflections of my laptop on my glasses, but I wanted to convey the size. I named these two Ego and Id because they're bigger than my head!

PPS: Check out the intense blue skies in the photos. We have not had a drop of rain. Well, to be absolutely honest, we had .17 inch of rain for all of December 2011. We had 17 inches in December 2010. We're facing a bit of drought and I'm working on a post about it. Stay tuned!