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Marquand Park Foundation, P.O. Box 415

Lover's Lane, Princeton NJ 08542

Common Name

Colorado spruce

Scientific Name

  Picea pugens  ‘Engelmann’ (Pinaceae, Pinales)

Inventory Numbers: 556


Coloradospruce (Picea pungens) is an evergreen pyramidal tree with horizontal branches. The tree is native the western Rocky Mountains. Theneedlesare about 1 1/2-3 inches long and have a gray-green color. Variants almost always have a silvery-blue or intense blue foliage (see Colorado blue spruce). The needlesarevery stiff and sharp and therefore hard to handle with bare hands. Trees generally growto 50 feetwith a canopy spread of 20 feet. Species in the wild can grow much larger. The tree haspale-green cones when immature, becoming brown or tan with maturity. The Coloradospruce is often usedas a Christmas tree or as an ornamental garden tree, particularly in the eastern United States and Europe. It is the official state tree of both Colorado and Utah.Genus names derived from Latin pix meaning “pitch” in reference to the sticky resin typically found in spruce bark. The specific epithet means “sharp-pointed” in reference to the stiff needles.


MP #556. Picea pugens ‘Engelmann’

Marquand Park Specimen Label and Coordinates: # 556

Specimen Provenance:

Common name: Colorado Spruce, Silver Spruce, Blue Spruce

Species Origin: Western USA

New Jersey Status: USDA Unreported

Habit: 80 – 115’ tall; bole 1 ½ – 3’ diameter. Symmetrical pyramidal shape.

Hanitat: Zones 2 – 7. High mountains on dry slopes and stream banks.

Trunk/Stem: Bark puple-gray scaly. Branches slightly to strongly drooping. Twigs usually hairless (compared to Engelmann Spruce).

Leaves: Evergreen, needle-like. Four sided very rigid, very prickly needles, 1 ¾” long, spine tipped, gray-green to blue–gray growing on pale brown shoots. The needles point outward from the branches in all directions. Often blue tint to foliage due to waxes on the needle surface.

Flowers: Monoecious

Fruits and seeds: Cone hanging, pale-brown 2 ½ – 4 1/2 ” long, ovoid to cylindrical, slightly curved. Scale tips narrow, acute, wavy.

Genus names derived from Latin pix meaning “pitch” in reference to the sticky resin typically found in spruce bark. The specific epithet means “sharp-pointed” in reference to the stiff needles.

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