Fraser Fir

Fraser Fir (Abies fraseri) is a species of fir native to the mountains of the eastern United States. It is closely related to Balsam Fir (Abies balsamea), of which it has occasionally been treated as a subspecies (as A. balsamea subsp. fraseri (Pursh) E.Murray) or a variety (as A. balsamea var. fraseri (Pursh) Spach).

The species is named after the Scottish botanist John Fraser (1750–1811), who made numerous botanical collections in the region.[3] It is sometimes misspelled as "Frazer" or "Frazier".


In the past, it was also sometimes known as "she-balsam" because resin could be "milked" from its bark blisters,[6] in contrast to the "he balsam" (Red Spruce) which could not be milked. It has also occasionally been called balsam fir, inviting confusion with A. balsamea
.

The Fraser Fir is a small evergreen coniferous tree growing to between 30 and 50 feet (10–15 m) tall (rarely to 80 ft [25 m]) with a trunk 16 to 20 inches (40–50 cm) across (rarely up to 30 in, 75 cm). The crown is conical, with straight branches either horizontal or angled 40° upward from the trunk; it is dense when the tree is young, but becomes more open as it ages. The bark is thin and smooth, gray-brown with numerous resin blisters on young trees, becoming fissured and scaly with age. The foliage is strongly turpentine-scented.



The leaves are needle-like, arranged spirally on the twigs but twisted at the base to spread in two rows; they are 0.4 to 0.9 inches (10–23 mm) long and 79 to 87 mils of an inch (2–2.2 mm) broad, flat and flexible with a rounded or slightly notched tip, dark green to glaucous green above, often with a small patch of stomata near the tip, and with two silvery white stomatal bands on the underside.

The cones are erect, cylindric, 1.4 to 2.75 inches (3.5–7 cm) long (rarely to 3.2 in [8 cm]) and 1.0 to 1.2 inches (2.5–3 cm) broad (rarely as broad as 1.5 in [4 cm]) broad, dark purple, turning light brown when mature, with long reflexed green, yellow or pale purple bract scales, and often resinous. The cones disintegrate when mature at four to six months old to release the winged seeds.

The balsam fir variety Abies balsamea var. phanerolepis is regarded by some botanists as a natural hybrid between balsam fir and Fraser fir, as Abies × phanerolepis (Fernald) Liu.