Other Common Names:
Fir, Balsam, White Fir, Var, Silver Pine, White Spruce, Canadian Fir
Next to the spruces, the balsam fir is the most common of our softwoods, however, the balsam woolly aphid killed off large areas in the 1950's.
The tree is usually from 40 to 60 feet high and from 8 inches to 16 inches in diameter. The crown is slender and spire shaped. The branches, extending down to the ground in young trees, come out from the stem in regular whorls. The bark on all but the old trees is very thin, smooth, and conspicuously marked with raised blisters containing balsam.
The tree is found in pure stands also mixed with white, red and black spruce, tamarack, aspens and white birch. It is found on a variety of sites but does best on a moist, well-drained loam.
The wood, although inferior in strength and quality to the spruce, is used extensively for pulp and lumber.
DESCRIPTION
LEAVES: Needle-like, flattened in cross-section, rounded or notched at the tip, usually appearing two-ranked, 3/4 to 1 1/4 inches long, dark shiny green above, whitish below.
FLOWERS: Male, unisexual; male yellowish to red, female purple, both on same tree.
FRUIT: October; an erect, oblong, dark purple cone 2- 4 inches long, scales fan-shaped, slightly longer than broad, with short-pointed, bracts disappearing at maturity; seeds purple.
TWIGS: Slender, smooth, more or less hairy, yellow-green. Rounded buds, 1/8 to 1/4 of an inch long, orange-green.
BARK: Smooth, pale grey on young stems with prominent resin blisters; becoming roughened somewhat scaly, red-brown; on very old trunks broken into small irregular plates.
WOOD: Light, soft, not strong somewhat brittle, non-porous; pale yellow to light reddish-brown.
This is the provincial tree of New Brunswick.
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