Jack Pine

This is an irregular scrubby pine tree that grows around the Great Lakes Region and some of New England and in much of Canada from around...Read More Nova Scotia up into the Northwest Territory. I've seen it the most in central Minnesota around Brainerd. It is fast growing of 2 to 3 feet/year and prefers acid (about 4.5 to 6.6 pH), sandy soils, but I have seen a few planted in the Chicago, IL, area in barely acid, silty soils. There are a number doing well in the sandy, acid soil of the Indiana Dunes in northwest Indiana. It always has its curved pine cones, about 1 to 2 inches long with short prickles on the scales, present that open best after a forest fire. Its short needles are 1 to 1.5 inches long, stiff, and in bundles of 2. It lives about 60 years and then deteriorates after that. It develops moderately deep roots but without a taproot and is best to transplant in spring. It is not grown by conventional nurseries, but by some native plant or lumber tree nurseries. It is very similar to the Virginia Pine of the East Coast and South; the latter having longer needles. I really like pine trees, even the scrubby ones that are not favoured by the ornamental landscape industry.

Jack pines make up a good portion of the boreal forest cover, often found with tamarack, aspen and paper birch. They establish in very d...Read Morery, rocky soil that other trees can't grow in, and areas recently burned. It is the best adapted of all boreal conifers to fire.

Jack pines aren't considered attractive trees for landscaping. They have an irregular form, dead branches self-prune poorly and cones are retained for several years. They are also very intolerant of shade. Jack pines can be attacked by lodgepole pine dwarf mistletoe (Arceuthobium americanum), a parasitic plant.

This pine produces poor timber, but is useful, because it will grow in northern areas of dry, infertile soil that would otherwise support...Read More no tree growth.

The Jack Pine has very short needles, only 1" to 1 1/2" long. The 1 1/2" to 2 1/2" cones are usually curved or bulging on one side. They are thornless, or have very tiny prickles. Fires will cause the cones to open and release the seeds.

No other pine that grows so far North has such short needles or curved cones. A tree that has it's southern range in our northernmost states, it mainly grows across Canada.