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Pinus halepensis
Aleppo pine
Aleppo pine, Jerusalem pine (Eng); pino carrasco, pino de Alepo (Spa); pi blanc (Cat); Aleppo pinua (Baq); piñeiro de Alepo (Glg).
Non-Native
DID YOU KNOW...? The impressionist painter Paul Cézanne had an Aleppo pine in the garden of his studio in Aix-en-Provence (France) that inspired his painting 'The Big Trees' (National Gallery of Scotland).
DESCRIPTION
Tree that can be up to 20 m tall, often with a twisted trunk in older specimens, with greyish or whitish bark and twigs. Its crown is rounded or irregular in shape and not usually very dense in adult trees, but conical in young ones. The leaves develop in groups of two, are very thin and elongated (acicular). They are generally 6-10 cm long and up to 1 mm wide. The cones are small, 4-8 cm long, with an elongated ovoid-conical shape. They are bright yellowish brown, and attached by a fairly thick stalk that is 1-2 cm long. The greyish or brownish pine nuts are also small (around 6 mm) and have quite a large wing (about 2 cm long) that aids their dispersal once the ripe cone opens. Many dry cones from previous years remain on the branches of adult specimens, a characteristic that helps us differentiate this pine from its relatives.
ECOLOGY
This pine needs Mediterranean climates, with a lot of sun, mild winters and little precipitation. It grows well on dry hillsides, preferentially on limey soils near the coast, and it is able to prosper on poor and barren substrates. It is one of the most drought-resistant pines. In the Canaries, it is limited to small stands in the lower zones of the midslopes, or medianías (zones between altitudes of 600 and 1500 m).
DISTRIBUTION
This tree occurs naturally in the Mediterranean region. Throughout the history of the Canary Islands, the Aleppo pine has been used in reforestation, which has helped it become established in the wild on almost all the islands in the archipelago, specifically El Hierro, La Gomera, Tenerife, Gran Canaria, Fuerteventura and Lanzarote.
