{"id":21742,"date":"2023-03-27T09:25:11","date_gmt":"2023-03-27T13:25:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.purdue.edu\/fnr\/extension\/?p=21742"},"modified":"2025-07-31T15:00:32","modified_gmt":"2025-07-31T19:00:32","slug":"intro-to-trees-of-indiana-eastern-white-pine","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.purdue.edu\/fnr\/extension\/intro-to-trees-of-indiana-eastern-white-pine\/","title":{"rendered":"Intro to Trees of Indiana: Eastern White Pine"},"content":{"rendered":"

The classic and trusted book “Fifty Common Trees of Indiana” by T.E. Shaw was\u00a0published in 1956 as a user-friendly guide to local species.\u00a0\u00a0Nearly 70 years later, the publication has\u00a0been updated through a joint effort by the Purdue Department of Forestry and Natural Resources,\u00a0Indiana 4-H<\/a>, and\u00a0the\u00a0Indiana Department of Natural Resources<\/a>, and reintroduced as “An Introduction to Trees of Indiana.”<\/p>\n

The\u00a0full publication<\/a>\u00a0is available for download for $7 in the Purdue Extension Education Store. The field guide helps identify common Indiana woodlot trees.<\/p>\n

Each week, the Intro to Trees of Indiana web series will offer a sneak peek at one species from the book,\u00a0paired with an\u00a0ID That Tree video from Purdue Extension forester\u00a0Lenny Farlee<\/a>\u00a0to help visualize each species as it stands in the woods.\u00a0Threats to species\u00a0health\u00a0as well as\u00a0also\u00a0insight into the wood provided by the species, will be provided\u00a0through additional resources as well as the\u00a0Hardwoods of the Central Midwest<\/a>\u00a0exhibit of the Purdue Arboretum, if available.\"Drawing<\/a><\/p>\n

This week, we meet the eastern white pine or\u00a0Pinus strobus<\/em>, which historically was one of the tallest trees in the eastern United States.<\/p>\n

This conifer is the only five-needled pine native to Indiana, meaning that the bundles of needles coming off the branches in one location, also called fascicles, include five needles per bundle. These needles are typically between two and four inches long and are blue green in color. Needles remain on the tree for two to three years before dropping in the fall.<\/p>\n

The bark on younger trees is dark and relatively smooth, and becomes quite furrowed in older trees. The eastern white pine adds a ring of side branches and a terminal shoot yearly with age.<\/p>\n

The cones of this species are up to eight inches long, have relatively thin scales and are often covered with quite a bit of white sap or pitch. Cones remain on the tree for two years.<\/p>\n

Eastern white pine trees typically grow to between 65 and 100 feet tall, but can exceed 150 feet tall in old growth forests. This species prefers acidic, moist and well-drained soil, but can tolerate alkaline soils. Eastern white pine is native to the central and eastern United States and Canada. Its range extends as far west as Arkansas, Missouri, Iowa and Minnesota in the U.S. and Manitoba in Canada. Its distribution reaches south through the Great Lakes states and in the Appalachian Mountains into northern Georgia as well as east along the Atlantic seaboard.<\/p>\n