Family: Pinaceae, Pine view all from this family

Description Pine with narrow, pointed crown of slender, nearly horizontal branches turned up at ends, becoming irregular with age, and with abundant cones remaining closed many years.
Height: 30-80' (9-24 m).
Diameter: 1-2 1/2" (0.3-0.8 m).
Needles: evergreen; 3 in bundle; 3-7" (7.5-18 cm) long; slender, stiff, yellow-green.
Bark: gray and smooth, becoming dark gray and fissured into large, scaly ridges.
Cones: 3 1/4-6" (8-15 cm) long; egg-shaped, clustered in many rings or whorls, stalkless and turned back, shiny yellow-brown; cone-scales raised and keeled, ending in short, stout spine. Blackish seeds about 1/4" (6 mm) long; narrow wing 1-1 1/4" (2.5-3 cm) long.

Habitat Forms almost pure stands on poor, coarse, rocky, mountain soils.

Range SW. Oregon south to S. California; local in N. Baja California, Mexico; at 1000-2000' (305-610 m) in north; 1500-4000' (457-1219 m), sometimes higher, in south.

Discussion The whorls of many knobby, closed cones help identify this species. Since the cones may become imbedded within the wood of the expanding trunk, this species has been called "the tree that swallows its cones." When fires kill the trees, cones as much as 30 years old are opened by the heat and shed their seeds. The abundant seedlings then begin a new forest.