Pinus halepensis Mill.
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Pinus halepensis Mill.
Pinaceae (Pine Family)MediterraneanAleppo Pine |
March Photo
Plant Characteristics: Tree, 30-60 feet tall with open irregular crown of many short, ascending branches; bark gray and smooth becoming fissured; lvs. in fascicles of 2, sometimes 3, slender, 2.5-6 inches long, minutely serrulate, light green, the persistent sheaths 1/3 in. long; cones 3-4.5 inches long, oval to oblong, spreading or deflexed, short-stalked, reddish to yellow brown, glossy, persistent for several years with unarmed scales and dorsal obtuse umbo; seeds 1/4 in. long with wing to 1 in. long.
Habitat:
Escape from cultivation. Thrives
in desert heat, drought and wind, good at seashore.
Tender when young; established trees can take near-zero temperatures.
(Sunset Editors, New Western Garden Book 1984. 412).
Name:
Latin, pinus, the classical
name. (Bailey 104). Halepensis, of Aleppo, ancient region east of the Mediterranean.
(Bailey 15).
General:
Uncommon in the study area, the plants that have been found are escapes
from cultivation. Photographed in Big Canyon on the flats at the northerly end
of Eastbluff and Santa Ana Heights. In
1995, I visited the tree on the flats at the northerly end of Eastbluff and
secured a cone and leaves. From
these, John Johnson has identified the tree as Aleppo Pine. The tree has grown during the ten years since my last photo,
and is about 25 feet tall at this time. The
Big Canyon tree is gone. In 1998,
another specimen was found in Santa Ana Heights.
(my comments).
Nearly all parts of various species of pine were used in some way by
various Indian tribes. Seeds were
usually roasted. Some Indians
strung the seeds to decorate dresses (strung on fiber of the wild Iris).
Charcoal from burning nutmeats was used by other tribes to treat sores
and burns. The soft center of green
cones was roasted in hot ashes, then eaten.
The pitch was a valuable glue for mending canoes and fastening arrowheads
and feathers. It was smeared on
burns and cuts or chewed like gum to allay rheumatic pains.
Twigs and rootlets yielded material for sewing baskets.
Medicinal teas were made from twigs, leaves and sometimes the bark.
The inner layer of bark was so frequently employed as an emergency food
that great stands of trees were found stripped of their bark by early settlers.
(Clarke 76).
The inner bark or phloem of pines contains Vitamin C, I believe.
The Finns, cut off from food supplies by the Russian blockade in the
1930's, prevented scurvy by using the inner bark of pines.
(John Johnson). It is best to pick cones for
pine nuts green and roast them to open the cone.
Otherwise, the nuts will already be gone.
Pine pitch if boiled, will not be sticky when it is cooled and remelted.
It can then be used to patch things, for glue and medicinal purposes.
(Lecture by Charlotte Clarke, author of Edible
and Useful Plants of California, April 1987). Pinus
species have been known to cause hay fever and asthma.
(Fuller 379).
The Cahuillas living near the San Jacinto mountains would situate their
villages in the middle of the Upper Sonoran Life Zone (3500-5000 ft.).
As food ripened in different areas, individuals and groups moved out from the village to harvest the crops.
There was no time when an entire village moved to another location as
each Cahuilla lineage had a permanent village judiciously located in relation to
the natural resources of an area. Pinyon pine nuts were gathered in the fall
along with numerous grass seeds, chia, saltbush seeds, palm tree fruit,
thimbleberry, wild raspberry, wild blackberry, juniper berry and chokecherry.
Pinyon and juniper trees were often situated ten miles or more from
villages, and family groups went to these groves to work as a team, returning
home usually within a week with a maximum harvest.
(Bean & Saubel 19).
Pine needles make a very pleasant tea simply for the taste, and have a
mild diuretic and expectorant function as well.
The inner bark boiled slowly for tea and sweetened with honey is still
stronger as an expectorant. The
pitch is the most specific of all; a piece the size of a currant is chewed and
swallowed. This is followed shortly
afterwards by strong, fruitful expectoration and a general softening of the
bronchial mucus. This remedy is
especially useful for children. (Moore,
Medicinal Plants of the Mountain West
126). Pine
bark not only does wonders for your garden, it also helps the body fight
disease, a New Zealand scientist, Dr. Kelly Duncan claims.
Dr. Duncan, dean of science at the University of Canterbury,
Christchurch, headed a team that worked out how to obtain a concentrated extract
of the Radiata pine bark using water rather than toxic solvents.
The result is the most potent antioxidant produced.
Barry Stirling, general manager of Enzogenol manufacturer NutraLife, said
the supplement protects against degenerative conditions such as arthritis, heart
disease and cancer. "Studies
have shown that many illnesses are related to the production of free radicals
and that antioxidants help to reduce their harmful effects," he said.
The marketer of another pine bark extract, PycnoGenol, said the benefits
of the active ingredients known as oligomeric proanthocyanidins has been known
for 50 years. PycnoGenol is
manufactured from grape seeds and the bark of maritime pine.
Managing director of the PycnoGenol manufacturer, Henk van Kooyk, said
pine extracts were discovered by Professor Jack Masquelier in 1943 and were a
pharmaceutical in France. (Rada
House, Brisbane, "Bark 'boosts body'" The Cairns Post 28
October 1998: 22. The
Radiata pine mentioned in the above article is Pinus
radiata, the Monterey pine, a California native which is apparently now
cultivated in Australia and New Zealand. (my
comments).
Text Ref:
Bailey 109; Munz, Flora So. Calif.
38; Sunset Editors, New Western Garden
Book 1984, 412.
Photo Ref:
April-May 85 #15; May 2 87 # 15; April-May 95 # 9,12; Mar-April 98 #
10,14.
Identity: by John Johnson
First Found: May 1985
Computer Ref: Plant Data 240.
Plant specimen donated to UC Riverside in 2004.
Last edit 8/7/05.
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March Photo