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Picea rubens, commonly known as red spruce, is a species of spruce native to eastern North America, ranging from eastern Quebec and Nova Scotia, west to the Adirondack Mountains and south through New England along the Appalachians to western North Carolina and East Tennessee.Farjon, A. (1990). Pinaceae. Drawings and Descriptions of the Genera. Koeltz Scientific Books . This species is also known as yellow spruce, West Virginia spruce, eastern spruce, and he-balsam. Red spruce is the provincial tree of Nova Scotia.
Notable red spruce forests in West Virginia can be seen at Gaudineer Scenic Area, Canaan Valley, Roaring Plains West Wilderness, Dolly Sods Wilderness, and Spruce Mountain, all sites of former extensive red spruce forest.
One of the consequences of acid rain deposition is the decrease of soil exchangeable calcium and increase of Aluminium. This is because acid precipitation disrupts Ion and nutrition cycling in forest ecosystems. Components of acid rain such as H+, Nitrate, and Sulfate limit the uptake of calcium by trees and can increase aluminum availability.
Calcium concentration is important for red spruce for physiological processes such as dark respiration and cold tolerance, as well as disease resistance, signal transduction, Cell membrane and cell wall synthesis and function, and regulation of . Conversely, dissolved aluminum can be toxic or can interfere with root uptake of calcium and other nutrients. At the ecosystem and community levels, Calcium availability is associated with community composition, mature tree growth, and ecosystem productivity. One study testing the effects of added aluminum to soil, found that P. rubens mortality rate increased under these conditions.
During the 1980s, increased acid deposition contributed to a loss of high-elevation red spruce trees caused by Soil leaching calcium and thus decreased freezing tolerance. Additionally, the structure of the spruce needle enhances the capture of water and particles, which has been shown to add to soil acidification, nutrient leaching, and forest decline. However, more recently, reductions in acid deposition have contributed to red spruce resurgence in some mountain areas in the northeastern United States. This increase in red spruce growth has been associated with an increase in rainfall pH, which reduces bulk acidic deposition. This suggests that policies aiming to reduce atmospheric pollution in this area have been effective, although other species sensitive to soil acidification, such as Acer saccharum, are still continuing to decline.
Prior to the late 19th century, of red spruce were in West Virginia. In the late 19th and early 20th century, a vast amount of logging began in the state, and the number of red spruce dwindled to . Silviculture is being used to help restore the population of the lost red spruce.
Significant efforts have been made to increase the growth of red spruce trees in western North Carolina, most notably by Molly Tartt on behalf of the Daughters of the American Revolution (DAR). Tartt embarked on a mission to find the lost red spruce forest that had been planted by the DAR as a memorial to the lives lost during the American Revolution. The forest, consisting of 50,000 trees was dedicated in 1940 and had until recently been forgotten until Tartt located and identified the forest near Devil's Courthouse.
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