Photo: Amber M. King, CC BY 4.0 · Wikimedia Commons

Spruce Pine

Pinus glabra

Also called cedar pine, Walter pine, Walter's pine, bottom white pine.

A soft-needled pine of southern river bottoms, one of the few pines that grows in part shade, for moist ground or a tall screen.

EvergreenTolerates shadeTolerates wet soilHedge or screenWildlife value

Type: Large tree
Mature height: 40–80 ft
USDA zones: 7–9
Growth rate: Fast
Sun: Full, Part, Shade
Soil moisture: Average, Wet
Grows wild in: Floodplain forests, stream banks, swamps and wet flats
Native range: Alabama, Florida, Georgia, Louisiana, Mississippi and South Carolina Also recorded in 1 other state, outside its native range. See what is native in your state

Hardiness zones Find your zone by ZIP code

Spruce pine grows scattered through the hardwood bottoms of the southern coastal plain and seldom forms pure stands. Its seedlings start in the shade of magnolia, beech and oaks, and in time the pines rise above them. The bark, smooth and gray at first, becomes closely ridged with age, like a spruce's. It is immune to fusiform rust, a serious disease of other southern pines. Plant it as a screen or windbreak on moist ground, or as a specimen pine among hardwoods.

Size, growth and what to expect

Forest trees measured at 15 years stood 38 to 49 feet tall, and our growth estimator uses that fast rate, about two and three quarter feet a year. Under heavy competition it grows slowly. It grows 40 to 80 feet tall and 30 to 40 feet wide. Scattered forest trees often reach 90 to 100 feet, and the largest reach 125 feet.

It bears cones from about 10 years old, most heavily from 20 to 40. Pollen is shed in February and March, and the small cones ripen in October of their second year. Seed falls in October and November. Bobwhite quail and squirrels eat the seed, and imperial moth caterpillars feed on the needles.

It grows wild on the coastal plain from eastern South Carolina to northwest Florida and west to eastern Louisiana. It has also been recorded in the District of Columbia, where it is not native.

How to grow Spruce Pine

Spruce pine grows in full sun or part shade, and its seedlings stand deep shade. It wants an acid soil that stays moist, and it takes ground that floods now and then. It grows best without grass around it. Plant it 20 feet from a wall, and set trees 20 feet apart for a screen. Keep it more than 50 feet from overhead wires.

Saplings ship bare-root or potted. Plant from late fall to early spring, in a hole wider than the roots and no deeper. Set the root collar at the soil line, and put the native soil back in. Seed needs about four weeks of cold, damp storage in the refrigerator. Sow it in spring, pressed into the surface of a damp bed under a little pine straw. Seedlings depend on root fungi, and those that fail to form them usually die.

Water weekly through the first two summers unless the ground stays wet. It needs little pruning, and deer seldom damage it. Its thin bark leaves it easily killed by fire at any age.

Each tree carries both male and female cones, but a lone, poorly pollinated tree sets little viable seed. Because it grows scattered, it suffers fewer insects and diseases than other southern pines. A gall mite stunts some shoot tips, and the Nantucket pine tip moth harms it only where it is planted outside its range. Strong winds can break it, and a canker sometimes kills a branch, which can be cut out.

Heights and zones are typical ranges for the species in cultivation; local conditions and seed source shift them.

Sources (11)