Abies fargesii - Farges' fir description

Scientific name: Abies fargesii  Franchet  1899

Synonyms: Abies fargesii var. fargesii

Infraspecific taxa: Abies fargesii var. faxoniana (Rehder & E.H.Wilson) Tang S.Liu  1972,  Abies fargesii var. sutchuensis Franch.  1894    

Common names: Farges' fir, Bashan Lengshan (Chinese)

Description

Tree to 40 m tall, with trunk to 2 m in diameter. Bark gray, flaking, darkening, browning and finally breaking into deep ridges and furrows with age. Branchlets hairless to shaggy with reddish hairs, especially in the grooves between the leaf bases. Buds 3-6(-8) mm long, variably resinous. Needles arranged to  the sides of the twigs in several rows, the upper rows shorter and bent up above the twigs on branches bearing seed cones, 1-2.5(-4.5) cm long, shiny bright green to dark green above, the tips usually notched, but sometimes blunt or pointed. Individual needles flat in cross section and with a modest to large resin canal on either side (usually) away from the lower epidermis and also well in from the leaf margins, the margins sometimes slightly rolled under, sometimes with a few short lines of stomates in the groove above near the tip and with 8-12 lines of stomates in each greenish white to silvery stomatal band beneath. Pollen cones 10-15 mm long, red. Seed cones elongate egg-shaped to cylindrical, (3-)5-9(-10) cm long, 3-4.5 cm across, violet when young, maturing purplish or reddish brown. Bracts about as long as the fuzzy seed scales or sometimes a little shorter, the narrow tip usually a little longer and peeking up between the scales to bending down a little ower them, or sometimes hidden. Persistent cone axis swollen in the middle. Seed body 5-8 mm long the wing about as long. Cotyledons four to six.

The species name honors Père Paul Guillaume Farges (1844-1912), a French missionary and naturalist who collected the type specimen during botanical collecting in western China.

Central China, from southern Gansu to western Henan, south to northern Guizhou and northwestern Yunnan. Forming pure stands or mixed with other conifers and hardwoods on mountain slopes in the subalpine zone and below; (1,500-)2,100-3,700(-4,000) m.

Conservation Status

Red List Category & Criteria: Least Concern

Varieties:

Abies fargesii ‘Headfort‘ 

Attribution from: Conifers Garden