Colorado Spruce

Native to the Rocky Mountains, the magnificent Colorado Spruce (Picea pungens) tree develops into a bold presence in the landscape. Strong lines and a dense pyramidal form, this wonderful evergreen brings structure and a formal polish to your garden design.

You may have seen some of the named cultivars of this native tree with powdery blue needles. These blue-toned, cloned and grafted trees are commonly known as Colorado Blue Spruce.

Our trees are carefully grown from a premier strain of the native trees. You'll love the color range from dark, steely green to blue-green and silver-blue. Our Colorado Spruce are grown on their own roots into incredibly hardy, strong, long-lived plants.

Use this tall, native forest evergreen if you have an eyesore from your second or even third story window. It can be used in a massive windbreak that you want along the edge of your property.

It will be the perfect living Christmas tree, ready-made for lights.

Colorado Spruce can be used by municipalities and commercial property managers as an easy-care tree. It has a perfect shape, and tiered horizontal branches. This is one of the most popular conifers ever sold.

Colorado Spruce holds dense needles on attractive horizontal branches in a broad pyramidal shape. This is a formal evergreen with a very desirable, uniform, pyramidal shape and wonderful forest-fresh fragrance.

When winter hits, and it's covered in a picture perfect layer of snow, you'll swear Norman Rockwell painted it. In spring, new growth is blue-green, and summer can range from silvery-blue foliage to aqua blue-green, running to dark green. It holds its color well through the growing season.

You'll appreciate the care-free, year-round interest. Simply plant, water to establish the first season or two, and you really do not have much else to do. It just gets better every year.

Colorado Spruce are excellent cover for birds and wildlife. Order yours today and get started enjoying the effortless beauty of this handsome tree.

How to Use Colorado Spruce in the Landscape

Colorado Spruce is incredibly hardy and very tolerant of big, wide open windy areas. These are some of the best plants to use for windbreaks and shelterbelts.

Colorado Spruce will produce a very dense screen that is twice as tall as they are wide. Plant them in odd numbers and vary the spacing between plants for a much more relaxed look.

No one said they have to be planted in a row! Consider using curved lines that follow the contours of your property.

Include other evergreens, like Eastern Red Cedar and Ponderosa Pine for a mixed planting that will support the diverse needs of wildlife. Include Chickasaw Plum and other small trees that flower in front. They make an excellent backdrop for Lilacs, Magnolias and other deciduous flowering plants that change color and drop their leaves in autumn.

A single Colorado Spruce makes the perfect specimen plant for open sunny areas. Try going big and create a focal point with three in a loose triangle planted 20 feet apart on center. Measure from the center of one to the center of the next to give them plenty of room to mature. Mulch the area between to keep things easy for yourself and to unify the look.

Large scale screening projects are a wonderful use for Colorado Spruce. Space them 12 to 15 feet apart to make a nice screen, while allowing the plants to have good circulation around them. Try an old farmer's trick and stagger the line with a zig-zag planting pattern for faster results.

#ProPlantTips for Care

Colorado Spruce won't tolerate standing water or wet soils for long, so please keep that in mind in low lying areas.

It is adaptable to many types of soils, but the ground must drain well after a rainfall. If you see puddles in your planting site, you can add additional soil on top to a depth of 24 inches and plant in that mound.

Provide a moderate amount of regular water for your Colorado Spruce. The needles like to be kept dry, so use drip irrigation to water the soil rather than overhead sprinklers which spray the plants.

Pruning is seldom needed. Please do not cut of the bottom branches to make it easier to mow around. Spruce should be branched to the ground. Remove the lawn area underneath as they grow and develop and place a layer of mulch over the root system.

This special evergreen makes such a wonderful statement in the landscape. But it's no diva, this is a low maintenance tree you'll love without having to worry about it.

It loves growing in wide, open, windy areas in full sun. Once established, it's one of the most drought tolerant of the Spruces.

Order yours today!