Tamarack

Larix laricina

It is a northern species which grows mainly east of the Rockies and in a few isolated groups of trees in the Nechako Valley. Tamarack can grow to about 80 feet tall and 18 inches in diameter and usually live about 150 years. It is usually found with black spruce on poorly drained soils, bogs, and swamps - and on cool, moist, north-facing slopes.tamarack is a decidous conifer meaning it loses its needles unlike many other conifer who keep them year round. Needles are three-sided and blue green, turning bright yellow in autumn. They grow in clusters of 15 to 25 on short woody projections which remain on the twig after the needles fall. The small, round seed cones are red at flowering and turn brown with age. Pollen cones are yellow. Young trees have a smooth gray bark. As the trees mature their bark becomes scaly and reddish-brown.