Plant · P-559

Pinyon Pine

Pinus edulis

Pinyon Pine is the source of the American pinyon nut, a slow-growing tree of the dry, rocky mesas and foothills of the American Southwest. It depends on winter moisture soaking into the soil rather than summer rain, which mostly runs off and evaporates before the tree can use it. It can live 500 to 1,000 years, but a planting is a legacy asset rather than a quick crop - seed production doesn't peak until the tree is 75 to 100 years old, and even then only in good years spaced three to seven years apart. Its foliage is unpalatable to grazing livestock, but its seed is a staple food for jays, nutcrackers, chipmunks and squirrels.