Black Hills Spruce
Black Hills Spruce (Picea glauca var. densata) – The Black Hills Spruce is a good yard or ornamental tree. It has a conical shape and its compact, dense, ascending branches are deep green in color. This evergreen is a tough tree for difficult sites. It is adapted to cold and is very resistant to winter injury. The Black Hills spruce can be used as a windbreak and shelterbreak, privacy screen, accent planting, group plantings in recreation areas and public grounds, and it is a good choice for a Christmas tree, as it requires little pruning.

The Black Hills spruce is a large evergreen with a central trunk and dense, ascending, lateral branches from the ground up that form a broad pyramidal to conical crown. It varies from the typical white spruce in its denser, more compact habit and slower growth rate. The thin bark is ashy gray or brown, shallowly fissured and separated into thin flaky scales. The needles are individually attached and foliage color varies from deep green to blue green. The brown cylindrical cones appear in late July and may persist on the tree into January. It grows best in acidic, moist loams with full sun, but adapts to a variety of conditions including shade, drought, hot and cold. It is flood intoleratn and sensitive to soil compaction.

This spruce provides nesting sites for birds and makes a good winter cover. The seeds provide food for songbirds, upland ground birds and small mammals such as porupines. The foliage is lightly browsed by deer.

The Black Hills spruce is a naturally occurring variety of the white spruce. It is a native from New Foundland to Alaska, south to Maine, northern New York and Michigan, northern Minnesota, northwest Montana, the Black Hills of South Dakota and adjacent Wyoming. It is the state tree of South Dakota. Plains indians used the inner bark and shoots for food and the hardened sap for gum. They collected the spruce wood for tipi poles. The wood is currently used for dimension lumber, pulp, boxes and crates.
 

Summary

Shape: Broad pyramidal base to conical crown
Leaves: Needles are single, somewhat rigid, sharply pointed, spirally arranged on the branches,
1/3 – 3/4 inches, dark green to blue green in color
Flower / Fruit: Male is tan to pale red, female is greenish to purplish. Cones are brown, 1-2 inches long
Growth Rate: Slow
Height: 40 feet
Zone: 2 to 6
Light: Full sun
Soil Type: Acid, moist, gravelly or sandy loam, fine clay soils
Comments: Good bonsai subject

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