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A mature female big-cone pine (Pinus coulteri) cone, the heaviest pine cone A young female cone on a Norway spruce (Picea abies) Immature male cones of Swiss pine (Pinus cembra) A conifer cone, or in formal botanical usage a strobilus, pl.: strobili, is a seed-bearing organ on gymnosperm plants, especially in conifers and cycads.
Strobili are often called cones, but some botanists restrict the use of the term cone to the woody seed strobili of conifers. Strobili are characterized by a central axis (anatomically a stem ) surrounded by spirally arranged or decussate structures that may be modified leaves or modified stems .
The female (seed) cones mature in about 20 months from pollination; when mature, they are yellow-brown in color, 15–25 cm (6– 9 + 3 ⁄ 4 in) long, and 5–7 cm (2– 2 + 3 ⁄ 4 in) broad, opening to 12 cm (4 + 3 ⁄ 4 in), and have a small, but sharp, downward-pointing spine on the middle of each scale.
The female cone then opens, releasing the seeds which grow to a young seedling. To fertilize the ovum, the male cone releases pollen that is carried in the wind to the female cone. This is pollination. (Male and female cones usually occur on the same plant.) The pollen fertilizes the female gamete (located in the female cone).
The female cones are large and usually woody, 2–60 centimetres (1–24 inches) long, with numerous spirally arranged scales, and two winged seeds on each scale. The male cones are small, 0.5–6 cm (1 ⁄ 4 – 2 + 1 ⁄ 4 in) long, and fall soon after pollination; pollen dispersal is by wind. Seed dispersal is mostly by wind, but some ...
The male cones are slender conic, 5–11 cm (2.0–4.3 in) long and 1–2 cm (0.39–0.79 in) broad and reddish-brown in colour and are lower on the tree than the seed cones. [3] Seedlings appear to be slow-growing [ 3 ] and mature trees are extremely long-lived; some of the older individuals today are estimated to be between 500 and 1,000 ...
A pine is any conifer tree or shrub in the genus Pinus (/ ˈ p aɪ n ə s /) [2] of the family Pinaceae. Pinus is the sole genus in the subfamily Pinoideae.. World Flora Online accepts 134 species-rank taxa (119 species and 15 nothospecies) of pines as current, with additional synonyms, [3] and Plants of the World Online 126 species-rank taxa (113 species and 13 nothospecies), [4] making it ...
The distinguishing characteristic is the reproductive structure known as a cone produced by all Pinales. All of the extant conifers, such as Araucaria, cedar, celery-pine, cypress, fir, juniper, kauri, larch, pine, redwood, spruce, and yew, are included here.