Your basket is empty.
Scientific name: Picea purpurea M.T.Masters 1906
Synonyms: Picea likiangensis var. purpurea (Mast.) Dallim. & A.B.Jacks., Picea purpurea subsp. purdomii Silba
Common names: Purple cone spruce (English), Ziguo yun shan (Chinese)
Tree to 40(-50) m tall, with trunk to 1(-2) m in diameter. Bark dark gray, becoming rough but remaining scaly with age. Crown conical, with fairly short horizontal to downswept branches turning up at the tips and bearing side branches all around. New branchlets pale yellowish brown, densely hairy. Buds 3-5 mm long, resinous. Needles shiny bright or dark green above, white beneath, 0.7-1.2(-1.4) cm long, angled forward and tightly pressed against the twigs and covering them, flattened top to bottom, without or with one or two incomplete lines of stomates on the two outer faces and four to six lines in the stomatal bands on the inner faces, blunt. Pollen cones 15-25 mm long, red. Seed cones 2.5-4(-7) cm long, dark reddish purple before maturity, ripening purplish brown. Seed scales diamond-shaped with a projecting tip, thin and flexible. Seed body 2.5-4 mm long, the wing 3-5 mm longer.
West-central China in southeastern Qinghai, southern Gansu, and northwestern Sichuan. In pure stands or mixed with other conifers and a few hardwoods in subalpine and upper montane forest on north-facing slopes; 2,600-3,600 m.
Red List Category & Criteria: Near Threatened
Picea purpurea has suffered a reduction in its population over the past 100 years but substantial areas of forest remain. Its reduction is estimated to have been below the threshold for Vulnerable, but it remains to be seen whether the current logging ban will have completely halted it. If logging continues to a lesser extent, this species could meet the criteria for a threatened listing in the near future. Accordingly, the category Near Threatened appears most appropriate.
Purple cone spruce forms extensive forests in NW Sichuan and in the Min Shan. Logging has occurred in these forests but substantial areas of natural or semi-natural forest remain. Logging where not accompanied by satisfactory natural regeneration (whether due to fire or grazing) has reduced the area of occupancy.
Picea purpurea is a subalpine species of continental mountains, occurring in a spruce belt at elevations between 2,600 m and 3,600 m a.s.l., predominantly on north-facing slopes. The soils are either grey-brown mountain soils or lithosols, usually podzolic. The climate is cold continental, with low to moderate precipitation, much of it as winter snow. It grows in pure forests or mixed with several other species of Pinaceae, e.g. Picea asperata, Picea wilsonii,), Larix potaninii, and Abies fargesii, which prevails above the spruce belt towards the tree line, and with some broad-leaved trees, usually Populus spp. and Betula spp. in clearings. At lower elevations Tsuga chinensis and Quercus spp. may occur.
This species yields high quality timber used for construction, furniture making, poles, machine and instrument making, including musical instruments, and to a limited extent for pulp in industrial manufacturing, e.g. paper. It was introduced to England early in the 20th century by Ernest Wilson and Joseph Rock and is commonly found growing in arboreta both in Europe and North America, but sometimes misidentified as Picea likiangensis, or treated as a variety of it (for the U.K. presumably based on its treatment in Dallimore & Jackson's Handbook, 1966). According to Rushforth (1987) introductions by Wilson from western Sichuan grow to taller, more columnar trees than those from Rock's collections, originating from southern Gansu, where the climate is drier and colder in winter.
This species is present in a few protected areas within its range. Additionally, the Chinese government’s current ban on further logging in sensitive areas should enhance the conservation of this species.
Picea purpurea ‘Hirtella’
Copyright © Aljos Farjon, James E. Eckenwalder, IUCN, Conifers Garden. All rights reserved.
