Winter Wednesday, Week 5, Trees Part 2

The kids and I borrowed a local park to collect cones and branches from, as well as our church grounds and our neighborhood. We had a good time collecting them, but trying to identify them was a little confusing! We used the Tree Identification Guide at the Arbor Day Foundation and, as a new tree identifier, I don't feel very confident in any we've identified, so feel free to post any corrections or suggestions. But all in all we had a great time-- even if we were a little sticky when we came home

The following picture is one that was hard to identify, and still a bit of a mystery. I hope you can tell from the picture, but the color of the needles is reddish/purplish. In the guide it matches up with the spruce trees, but this specific color didn't match any of the trees in the guide. Is it new growth? sick or dying? the weather? or where its planted? or just not listed in the guide? I don't know, but we specially grabbed this one while out collecting because of its color.

We identified this as a Ponderosa Pine, but the next picture also came up as a Ponderosa, and while the branches are very similar, the cones are pretty different.

Ponderaso too?? The cones in this one are longer and more slender than the shorter, fatter ones above.

This picture and the next both came up as Colorado Pinyons. One was collected from the park and the other from our church grounds.
Colorado Pinyon? I think so, the branches are similar: both have needles in bunches of 2, the needles of both leave little knobs when pulled off, needles of both are same shape, cones are also similar. It seems safe to say they are both Colorado Pinyon.

Colorado Blue Spruce-- the easiest to identify.

Austrian Pine