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Public Television presents Common Ground made possible by

The Minnesota Arts and Cultural Heritage Fund and the citizens

of Minnesota. Production funding of Common Ground

is made possible in part by First National Bank

Bemidji continuing their second century of service to the

community. A partnership for generations. Member

FDIC.

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Scott: Welcome to Common

Ground. I'm your host Scott Knudson. In this

episode due to popular demand Biologist

and Ecologist, Rob Knudson, my father,

returns to teach us how to identify the common

evergreens of Northern Minnesota.

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Rob: My name's Rob Knudson. I'm a

Biologist, Ecologist and a retired

teacher. And two years ago we did a program for Common

Ground where I helped you learn the

deciduous trees of North Central Minnesota. I tried to learn them by the

leaves and the bark. Today, we're going to do a follow up to that

program. Where we take the things that people normally call

pine trees, the conifers and sort them out.

If you'd like to review

the deciduous tree program. Just go to the link at the bottom

of the screen.

♪ Okay, today

we're going to take a look at the evergreens, what most people

call the pines. And we're going to learn to identify

them from the needles, from the trunks and from the shape

of the tree. It's not really correct to call these

trees pines. Because pines is simply one of the groups

that we have around here. We have other genuses. We have pines,

we have spruces, we have firs, we have

larches and we have cedars also. The best

term to use to describe these trees are conifers.

Now the word conifer is actually

Latin-Greek. Anytime you see the term

"ifera", "offera", "ifer" like conifer

"ifer" refers to the bearer of something. And obviously conifer

refers to the bearer of cones. Referring to the way

that these trees reproduce. These trees all

reproduce using cones instead of

flowers. ♪

Most deciduous trees that have fruit

reproduce with flowers and are pollinated by

insects. The smell

right here is just wonderful. These happen to be wild plums.

But the same thing is true of these

Nanking cherries and

pincherries and chokecherries and

crab apples.

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In most of the species of

conifers, the trees that reproduce with cones, the

male pollen cones, which you can see here on this Jack Pine

and here on this Red Pine are

located at the bottom of the tree. So when the wind blows the pollen

from the male pollen cones, the female cones

which turn into the things we normally call pine cones are located

usually at the top of the tree. The pollen from

a tree does not pollinate the female

cones of the same tree. So we get cross pollination.

Cross pollination getting genetic

material from two parents. The advantage of cross

pollination is that insures that in the next generation

of pine trees there's going to be some variation.

If you have variation, if everybody's

a little bit different then you can have some of the trees

a little better suited to live where they do than the other

ones. And those are the ones live long enough to reproduce

and they pass on those genes to the next generation. And you have a

better adapted tree. That's why trees are

different from state to state. And even from

area to area within the same state. In the conifers,

it's actually at least a two year process

from the time that the pollen fertilizes the eggs

in the female cone. Until the cone actually

matures, dries out, opens up and sheds it's

seeds. So much of the culture we have in Northern Minnesota

revolves around our forests and our coniferous

trees. And it really is a lot more fun to be able to walk through the woods

and recognize what it is that you're looking at.

It's early May in Northern

Minnesota. And it'd be a great time to take a walk in the woods

and look at some of our common evergreens. We'll take a look

at the needles. We'll take a look at the bark. And we'll take a look at the general

shape of the tree for comparison purposes.

Let's start with one of the very common evergreens in

Northern Minnesota, the Red Pines. Also known as a Norway Pine.

It's real common growing wild in the

forest and in large plantations.

This is a nice stand of

approximately 50 year old Red Pine. Look at the color of the

bark. Look at the size of the needles and the

shape of the tree. These are Red Pines.

You can see how much this

tree grew every year when it was small.

When these branches were the topside

branches the top of the tree was right there.

When these branches were the

side branches this was the top of the tree. One years

growth. There's another year. There's another year.

And you can see it going up the tree.

You can tell the Red Pine again by the color of the bark.

♪

Here's the White Pine. Another real

common species of evergreen in Northern Minnesota.

Known for it's beautiful white wood used for paneling and

other construction.

Here's a real good example of the typical

profile of a White Pine.

Okay here's the needles on the branch of a White Pine.

The one pine that you may confuse this one

with is the Red Pine but

the White Pine has very very soft needles as

compared to the Red Pine which are much stiffer and they're

bigger. If you wanted to get technical about it the White Pine

the needles occur in bunches of five.

Whereas on the Red Pine there's only two.

The White Pine needles are also significantly smaller than

Red Pine needles. Which are the biggest needles we have on any pine.

White Pines also have the biggest

cones of any of the conifers that we have in Northern

Minnesota - six, eight inches long at least.

The seeds have fallen out of these cones,

last fall probably. This is a White

Pine. Here's a White Pine and you can see

as you look up the trunk how much

that White Pine grew each year by the position of the

nodes. Where the branches come out. That top one

you can see that it grew almost 3 feet in one year.

This is a White Pine.

♪

Here's an

example of one of the things that can happen to a White Pine here in

Northern Minnesota. Two years ago

this tree was almost completely stripped of its bark

by a porcupine. And if

you look you can see that the pine tree has

secreted a whole bunch of sap trying to cover up its wounds but

this one's so substantially stripped that

I'm pretty sure this one will be dead in the next year or two.

♪

♪

Here is a great comparison

of a mature White Pine on the right

and a mature Red Pine on the left.

Note the difference in the bark.

♪

This rather

ragged looking conifer is another one of the pines.

This one you can see is not

tall and straight like a Red Pine. Pretty typical.

One of the most common trees that we have in Northern Minnesota. You might

notice that it's needles are

shorter than either a Red Pine or a White Pine.

This is in fact a pine, this is Jack Pine.

The tree itself can be just about any shape.

And this is a very typical looking Jack Pine tree. You can

see the bark is just kind of a rough

bark. But this is what they look like. This is Jack

Pine. One of the most common trees of Northern Minnesota.

On this Jack Pine you can see on these lower

branches you can see the pollen

cones that are starting to form. In another month or so these will be

releasing gobs and gobs and gobs of pollen.

And then way up at the top of the tree

you'll see where most of the seed cones are

located. This is a Jack Pine.

Okay, right

here, this lowest branch that we see is a Jack

Pine. Take a note of the length of

the needles, and the color and the shape of the branches. Look

right above it. Right above it you have a

tree that looks kind of like a Jack Pine but

the needles are longer and a little bit more of a

blue green color than a dark green color. That tree right

there occurs around Northern Minnesota mostly

in plantations. That is what most people

call a Scotch Pine.

Technically the proper name for it is a Scots

Pine. And it was imported from Europe and it's planted in

plantations. But we happen to have one right here. It's easily confused

with Jack Pine. The Jack Pine has shorter needles and they're

darker green. Scots Pine has longer needles and

not as long as White Pine or Red Pine, but

longer than a Jack Pine. Ok, here's a good comparison

between an Eastern White Pine and a Scots Pine.

We compared it to Jack Pine already. The Scots Pine has shorter

needles, thicker needles than the White Pine.

And they're a little bit more of a bluish tinge to them than the White Pine.

You can see the White Pine has much finer needles and they're

greener than the Scots Pine.

Here we have the most common

spruce in Northern Minnesota. The northern

White Spruce. Check out the nice

conical shape which is an adaptation for shedding snow.

Here's a great example

of a probably 100+

year old White Spruce tree. Totally

mature with a nice White Pine in the background for comparison.

Okay, this is White

Spruce. I want you to note

how much variation there can be from one tree to

another. This is White Spruce. This is also White

Spruce. Look at how much longer the needles are on this one

than that one. How much more blue they are on this one

than this one. These are kind of the extremes. This one

has shorter needles. This one has longer. They're both

pokey. It all has to do with where the tree is growing.

How much light it gets. How much water it gets. How crowded

they are. How stressed they are. They're not all exactly

the same. But they're both pokey branches. This is

White Spruce.

Here's a young White Spruce.

Note the texture of the bark. Pokiness of the

needles. This particular one

is probably 11 or 12 years old.

Count the nodes.

This is a real good example

of a Colorado Blue Spruce. You can see

that it's more bluish colored than our White

Spruce that we have around here. I know it's Colorado Blue Spruce

because I planted it myself so it's planted in somebody's yard.

Things that you'll notice right away is the needles

are longer than the White Spruce and it's

very definitely even pokier that White Spruce

that we have around here. This is Colorado Blue Spruce.

Along with White

Spruce and Ornamental Colorado Blue Spruce

you may encounter 2 more kinds of

spruce as you get around Northern Minnesota. If you were to

go farther north and east of here up in let's say

the Boundary Waters Canoe Area you'd find some that look kind of like

this only they're darker. Those are called Black Spruce.

We don't many of those right where we're filming so I don't have an

example. And if you are out in the woods and you come across a

plantation of spruce that don't look right those are probably

Norway Spruce. Again, usually

they don't happen in the woods. Sometimes you see them along the sides

of roads. But usually they're in plantations for Christmas

trees. Okay, here is

a fairly classic example of a branch from a Balsam

Fir. What I would like you to notice

and try to remember about a Balsam Fir, is if you

see a branch where the needles are fairly flattened

that's probably a Balsam. And the needles

themselves are flat. And you can

grab a Balsam Fir and it's

nice and soft. Needles on

a Balsam Fir are nice and flat.

The branch is also flat and they're soft to the touch.

You can run your hand over them and you feel no pain.

Now for comparison, this is the Balsam

Fir. This is White Spruce.

And you might notice that the White

Spruce has usually... shorter needles.

These needles are not

flat on the surface. The needles

themselves are not flat . And when you grab

a White Spruce...it pokes you.

Balsam Fir

is nice and soft, doesn't poke. White Spruce

is kind of pokey. Balsam Fir

on the right and White Spruce on the left.

Compare the needles. Kind of an interesting

note when it comes time to have a Christmas tree

White Spruce makes a beautiful Christmas tree but it has

a tendency to smell real bad in the house.

On the other hand, Balsam is that tree that

leaves that really, really nice aroma.

A little hint possibly

to hunters: Balsam when

you smash the needles gives off that real

strong Balsam smell and deer are used

to smelling that. One thing that I would suggest

is a good idea if you're going to walk in the woods if you drop

a Balsam branch to the ground, and

scrub your feet on it...like that

it'll mask the human odor.

Ok, here's a good example of a mature

White PIne. And then right to the left of it here we have an opportunity

to see a medium size Balsam

Fir and White Spruce side by side.

Compare the tips, look at how uniform

the tip of the Balsam Fir is

compare to the White Spruce on the left. Well they aren't

always this way. But as a general rule this is

the way they're going to look. And then compare the bark.

Yeah, here's a Balsam Fir and then

for comparison look at the bark on the Balsam Fir

and compare it to this similar sized White Spruce.

Here you can see some

sap bubbles in the bark of a Balsam

Fir.

One interesting thing that you can see exceptionally

well on Balsam Fir is you can see the growth

pattern of the branches. If you look

right up here, right to the tip of the branch you can see, and again this

is May, you can see three brand new

little branches starting to grow.

Next year at this time, these three

branches will look like these three branches.

Last Spring at this time of the year,

this spot looked like that spot.

The year before that, this

spot looked like that spot.

That's one year growth, another year growth. And by

next Fall, this will be that long and it'll have two new

branches. This will have two new

branches and a new one there. And if you

look at the whole branch, you can see that this branch is

one, two, three, four, five,

six, seven years old where I broke it off.

And you can also see that by the fifth, sixth

and seventh years it's starting to lose it's needles. And

that's why when you see a branch on a tree

there are no needles next to the trunk of the older branches because

they lose them after five or six years.

Here's a rather interesting group of

conifers. These they have a bark

that's similar to a Spruce but if you look they have a really, really

fine looking needle. These are actually a type of

larch. This is Tamarack. And they always

grow in low swampy areas. They're tolerant of a lot of water.

You can see the yellow cowslips down

in the water. If you look very, very

closely you can see thousands and thousands of little

seed cones at the tops of these trees.

This is the only species of Larch that we have.

in Northern Minnesota. And in days gone

by, they used the really large

Tamaracks to make railroad ties. These

are kinda neat because they're the one species of

conifers around here that actually drop their needles

during the winter time. If we were to take this same shot

in October or November these would all

be yellow. And then by the middle of the winter they're bare.

They're just starting to grow new needles right now

by mid-summer the needles will be about twice as

big as they are right now. These are Tamarack.

Take a quick look at this Tamarack

branch. And you can real easily see the pollen

cones of the Tamarack there. And here is the seed

cone from last year. And that's all the bigger they get on a

Tamarack.

Here's an example of a branch of Northern White

Cedar. Sometimes called Arborvitae.

It usually grows down in low areas that are

wet, Cedar swaps, maybe you've heard that term. You might notice

that the needles on this are totally different than anything we've looked at so

far. They're flat,

they're not sharp, they're soft. This is

Northern White Cedar. A favorite

winter forage for deer.

Ok, here's a nice example

of Northern White Cedar.

If you look at the bark on the trunk you can see that it's a finer

bark than most of the actual pines and

spruces and it'll pull off in little strips.

Usually this grows down in swamps but this

one happens to be one of the few Cedars you'll find growing on higher ground.

This is a Northern White Cedar.

This is a typical place where Northern White

Cedar grows, low and wet.

You can also see that there's some Balsam and even some Birch in

here. And several other kinds of deciduous trees.

This is a Cedar swamp.

[leaves crunching]

Here's something kind of interesting

we're down in the Cedar swamp, and here's a nice

fresh Timberwolf track. Here's the four toes

and there's his pad right there. You can see how big he is

compared to my hand. That's not a real big one.

Now lets do a quick review of what we've

actually seen in our walk through the forest. And get ready for

a little quiz at the end of the program. Let's do a quick

review of the things that are actually pines. They're in

the genus of the pines. This again is

White Pine, soft needles, about three

inches long. Five needles per bunch.

White Pine.

The Red Pine, which has a little bit more course

needles and they come in batches of two.

The Jack Pine, which the needles are

shorter and kind of twisted around. The same as the tree is.

This particular one has some

pollen cones on it. And finally the

Scotch Pine or Scots Pine which is not native

to Northern Minnesota. Often times confused with the Jack Pine.

Scots Pine,

Jack Pine, Red

Pine and White Pine.

Ok, let's take a look at the spruce's.

And the one tree that one may be confused with a spruce.

This again is

Northern White Spruce, note the length of the needles.

Sharp needles, go all the way around.

Can be light green all the way to more of a

blue color, but that's the one you find out in the woods. This one

is ornamental Blue Spruce. Colorado

Blue Spruce, this is the one you usually see in town planted in people's yards

longer needles, real pokey.

Hard to grab. And

this is Balsam which is not a

spruce it's a fir. And again, flatter branches

flat needles, nice and soft to the

touch as opposed to pokey to the touch. Balsam

Fir, Colorado

Blue Spruce and

Northern White Spruce.

And finally these two, which are significantly different than the

other branches that we've looked at. This was

Northern White Cedar. It's the only Cedar that we have

remember Red Cedar is actually a type of Juniper.

Flat branches, very very

fleshy needles. Not sharp at all.

And this one, our only species of

larch, which is Tamarack.

And the needles on this one remember are deciduous, they fall

off in the fall. Now this is May, so these are brand new needles

they will get a little bit longer than this. This is

Tamarack, which is a species of Larch.

And Northern White Cedar.

Now let's have a little pre-quiz

to see if you can remember some of the things you've been looking at.

First of all let's look at these two. Both of them have

long needles. These needles are softer

than these, these are longer than these

these are darker green than these.

Ok, these are in bunches of five

and these are in bunches of two.

[wind blowing]

This was Red Pine and this is eastern White Pine.

Now these two.

This is the one that's real common just about everywhere

around Northern Minnesota. Shorter needles than

either the White Pine or the Red Pine.

Kind of not as neat of

a pattern as the White Pine or the Red Pine.

This is the one that's a real scruffy tree, doesn't have any

particular pattern to the tree. And this is the one

that comes from Europe that sometimes

is confused with this. And this one will be in plantations this one is

just about everywhere. This is

Jack Pine, real common. And this

was Scots Pine.

These are the four kinds of pines

that we have around here. Ok, here

are the shorter needled trees

around here, the ones that are more conical

shaped when you see them in the woods. This was the

one that's really, really common around here

comes in many different colors. This was

the one that came from out west that you

see in peoples yard. Both of those are the ones with

the pokey needles, longer needles, shorter needles.

This is the one that had a similarly shaped tree but the

needles are flat. And not pokey at all.

Ok, this one

is White Spruce,

Colorado Blue Spruce and Balsam

Fir.

Ok, this one real

soft, fleshy leaves. Grows down in

low places.

This is Northern White Cedar.

And this was the other one that grew in low places. This was the one

that was actually a deciduous conifer.

It's just growing new needles but it loses it's

needles in the winter time.

This is Tamarack. A type

of Larch.

And now I've mixed them up. See if you can figure out which

ones are which without any prompting at all.

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♪ White Pine.

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♪ Balsam Fir.

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♪ Scots Pine.

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♪ Northern White Spruce.

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♪ Tamarack.

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♪ Colorado Blue Spruce.

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♪ White Cedar or Arborvitae.

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♪ Jack Pine.

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♪ Red Pine.

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♪ Conifers are the most

majestic trees we have in Northern Minnesota. Just look at

this beautiful big White Pine.

It's really special to be able to walk through the woods in Northern

Minnesota and it's even better when you can actually recognize

what it is that you're looking at.

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Join us

again on Common Ground.

If you have an idea for Common Ground in north central

MInnesota email us.

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Production funding of Common Ground was made possible in part by

First National Bank Bemidji. Continuing their second century

of service to the community. A partnership for generations.

Member FDIC.

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