Virginia Pine or Scrub Pine

Pinus virginiana

Virginia pine is the first Species of the Week that is neither a fern nor a flowering plant.  It is a conifer.  Like flowering plants, conifers produce pollen which is carried by the wind (or by insects in many flowering plants) to a female where sperm riding in the pollen are able to fertilize the egg.  The fertilized egg then grows into an embryo which is encased protectively inside a seed.  Ferns, in contrast, do not produce seeds and have sperm that swim through water on the forest floor.  Conifers differ from flowering plants in that they produce pollen and eggs in cones, rather than in flowers.  The male, pollen-producing cones are small and delicate and fall off soon after they are finished producing pollen.  In pines, the female, seed-producing cones are woody and long-lasting, and are familiar to us as pine cones.  Pine cones consist of a number of scales in a whorl.  The seeds are produce on the scales and shed when the scales spread apart.  Many species of pine have a sharp thorn or prickle on the tip of each scale.

Virginia pine is also only the second species of the week that is woody.  All conifers are woody plants, either trees or shrubs.  All pines are trees, though some are small, shrubby trees. Virginia pine is definitely a tree, but not a very large one.  It tends to be scrubby, as seen in the  picture at left.  The lower branches often die, leaving a cluster of green branches at the top of a bare trunk.
 

Pines are in the genus Pinus, in the Pinaceae or Pine Family.  The name Pinus comes from the Latin word for pine.  There are about 80 species of pines in the world, primarily in the Northern Hemisphere.  Pines reach and cross the equator only in Sumatra in southeast Asia.  Pines are found in North America, Europe, Asia, and northern Africa. 

Pines differ from other conifers in having their leaves or needles in clusters.  Technically, botanists tell us that pines have two kinds of branches, ordinary long branches and dwarf branches.  The long branches have tiny, scale-like leaves.  Each tiny leaf is next to a very, very short dwarf branch which has elongated, needle-like leaves.  The dwarf branches of long needle-leaves are what we perceive as clusters of needles.  Each species of pine has a characteristic number of needles in a cluster.  Some species have five, some have two, some have three, and some have a mixture of two- and three-needle clusters.  Out west there are also pines with four needles in a cluster and pines with only one needle in a cluster.

Virginia pine is a two-needle pine.  The needles are stout, flexible, usually twisted and about 1-3 inches long. The female, seed cones are dark red-brown, about 2-3 inches long.  Each scale on the cone has a straight spine.  The cones tend to stay on the trees for several years.  The picture at right shows a Virginia pine branch with cones and green needles.  The picture below shows a fallen twig with an attached cone and some fallen needles. 

Virginia pine is also called Jersey pine and scrub pine.  It grows in dry, sandy, sterile soil, barrens, and old fields.  It can be found from southern New York to southern Indiana, south to Georgia and Alabama.  In Wildwood it grows on the eastern slope of the park.  It is hard to notice in the green season.  From a distance it blends in with the other trees, and up close it's just a trunk with the branches up high in the canopy and hard to see.

Wildwood has two other species of pine, shortleaf pine, and white pine.  Shortleaf pine has, despite the name, needles that are longer than those of Virginia pine, and the needles are in both 2's and 3's.  White pine has needles in 5's.

GGC