Wildlife Wednesday — Pine Cones & Pine Needles
By Andy Ames
Needles are not the only long lasting pine product of coniferous trees. Pine cones not only take a long time to decompose, but also take a long time to develop. Pollen and ovulate cones form near the ends of new growth in the spring. By fall, the spent pollen cones have dropped off the tree while ovulate cones, if fertilized, begin to transition into a pine cone. Still small in stature, they loose their bright color becoming green to woody brown for the winter. The following year those young cones will grow rapidly in size and mature by the second fall. Many cones open on their own and seeds are dispersed by the wind. Others, such as Lodgepole pines, require a heat source such as fire to break down the resin of the cone allowing it to open. As you can imagine, a lot can happen over a two year time span. Many cones do not survive to maturity and so we have bad mast years and good. This seems to be a low production year for Ponderosa cones in the Estes Valley as I have seen very few new cones. Don’t be deceived, however. Even old cones can stay up in trees for many years so a tree will continue to drop cones in good years and bad.
Male pollen cones form at the base of new sprouts in the spring, just beneath the terminal bud. Most pollen cones are on the lower branches of a pine and release plumes of pollen on windy days.
The female ovulate cones are fewer in number and also form near the end of new growth in spring. Although bright in color, you may have to bend the branch down to see the cone.
By fall the ovulate cone is starting to look like a little pine cone. If you look closely, you can see a couple of last year’s cones ripening below.
Pine squirrels are busy harvesting cones now before they open and disperse their seeds. As you are hiking through the woods you may hear the thunk, thunk, thunk, of cones dropped from high up in a pine. Small sprouts of new growth may be cut off as a byproduct. Later, the squirrel will come down and bury the cones one by one to be consumed over the winter and even into the next summer until a new crop is ready.
Due to their woody nature, pine cones take a long time to decompose. Here you can see many mature cones that have opened and lost their seeds, one immature cone that fell before fully developed, and many spent pollen cones buried amongst the needles.