Subalpine Fir

(Abies lasiocarpa)

Color Photograph: © by and courtesy of Charles Webber, California Academy of Sciences

Color Photograph: © by and courtesy of Timothy D. Ives

Subalpine Fir (Abies lasiocarpa)

Identifying Characters: The high altitudinal distribution of this species, the purple cones, and the absence of visible brachts on the cone will usually identify this species.

Similar Species: White fir is usually found at much lower elevations and the needles are longer and less crowded than in Subalpine Fir.

Measurements: Mature trees 45 to 100 feet tall and 1 to 2 feet in diameter although trees near the treeline can be very short, stunted, and bent.

Cones: Cones purple, cylindrical, 2.5 to 4 inches long; brachts small, covered by the cone scales.

Needles: Needles 1 to 1.75 inches long, green to blue-green with white lines on both surfaces and with rows of stomata on both upper and lower sides; needles crowded, bent almost perpendicularly and pointing upward, particularly on upper and new branches.

Bark: Smooth gray on younger trees becoming fissured and scaly in mature trees.

Native Range: Subalpine Fir is a widely distributed North American fir. Its range extends from 32° N. latitude in Arizona and New Mexico to 64° 30 N. in Yukon Territory, Canada. Along the Pacific coast, the range extends from southeastern Alaska, south of the Copper River Valley (lat. 62° N.), the northwestern limit; east to central Yukon Territory (lat. 64° 30' N.), the northern limit; south through British Columbia along the east slopes of the Coast Range to the Olympic Mountains of Washington, and along both slopes of the Cascades to southern Oregon. It is not found on the west slopes of the Coast Range in southern British Columbia or along the Coast Range in Washington and Oregon, but it does occur on Vancouver Island. It is also found locally in northeastern Nevada and northwestern California. Except where noted above, subalpine fir is a major component of high elevation Pacific Northwest forests.

In the Rocky Mountain region, Subalpine Fir extends from the interior valleys of British Columbia west of the Continental Divide and south of the Peace River (lat. 55° N.), south along the high elevations of the Rocky Mountain system to southern New Mexico and Arizona. In the north, its range extends from the high mountains of central British Columbia, western Alberta, northeastern Washington, northeastern Oregon, Idaho, Montana, to the Wind River Mountains of western Wyoming. In Utah, it commonly occurs in the Uinta and Wasatch Mountains, but is less abundant on the southern plateaus. The range extends from southern Wyoming, through the high mountains of Colorado and northern New Mexico, and westward through northeastern Arizona to the San Francisco Mountains. Subalpine fir is a major component of the high-elevation forests of the Rocky Mountains. (Silvics of North America. 1990. Agriculture Handbook 654.)

Habitat: Subalpine fir is found primarily in the subalpine zone of the Rocky Mountains up to timberline.