Spruce

A tall conifer in stacked cones of dark blue-green needles.

About 11.5 m tall out in the open. In the old forests it towers far higher: most stand two to four times that, the tallest up to nine times, and now and then an old giant stands among the rest.

Where it grows

Land	How many of the trees
Taiga	More than half
Hills	Three in ten

Trees of a kind keep together in stands about 60 m across.

Through the year

It keeps its needles all year. Snow lies thicker on its boughs than on the leafy trees.

In play

Its trunk stops men and horses, who go round it. Wildfire leaves it black and bare, and burnt or felled ground grows back over about four years.