(Japanese Fir, Momi Fir)

The wood of the momi fir is light colored and traditionally used to make coffins in its native Japan. A tall-growing evergreen, momi fir grows in Japan's highlands intermixed with other conifers. This tree grows slowly in its youth, retaining a dense, upright pyramid shape. When mature, the straight trunk becomes massive and the scattered horizontal branches look somewhat like the silhouette of an old white pine.

The emerald green needles are flattened and are alternating on the twigs in two...

(Giant Fir, Grand Fir)

This species is appropriately called the giant or grand fir because it's one of the tallest growing firs in the world, usually in the 200- to 300-foot (70 to 100 m) range. This evergreen is very fast growing, attaining a narrow column-like or spire-like silhouette with massive trunk. Native to the central Pacific coast of North America, the giant fir grows in British Columbia inland to the Idaho-Montana mountains and southward to northern California, where it's known along the coast. Some botanists...

(Nikko Fir)

Densely foliaged branches with glossy dark green needles makes the Nikko fir one of the most stately of fir species, although quite difficult to locate in nurseries. A tall evergreen conifer (cone-bearing) tree from Japan, it attains a spire-like shape but also becomes more pyramidal with age.

The glossy dark green needles have two white bands on their undersides. Densely lining all branches, the needles are held both horizontally and vertically, although the latter are shed earlier. New twig...

(Rocky Mountain Fir, Subalpine Fir)

Very tall and narrow in form, subalpine fir looks like a green church spire. A cone-bearing evergreen tree with green needles that have a bluish cast, it is native from the Yukon of Canada southward in the Rocky Mountains to northern Arizona and New Mexico in the United States. Its bark is gray to nearly white, smooth but mildly bumpy.

The short but flattened needles whorl around the tree's twigs. They are dark green but covered in a bluish-white film (called a bloom). In early summer, male cones...

(Subalpine Fir)

Very tall and narrow in form, subalpine fir looks like a green church spire. A cone-bearing evergreen tree with green needles that have a bluish cast, it is native from the Yukon of Canada southward in the Rocky Mountains to northern Arizona and New Mexico in the United States. Its bark is gray to nearly white, smooth but mildly bumpy.

The short but flattened needles whorl around the tree's twigs. They are dark green but covered in a bluish-white film (called a bloom). In early summer, male cones...

(Corkbark Fir)

Very tall and narrow in form, corkbark fir looks like a silvery green church spire. A cone-bearing evergreen tree with green needles that have a silver-blue cast, this natural variety of the subalpine fir is native to the southern Rocky Mountains in Arizona and New Mexico in the American Southwest. Its soft bark is gray to nearly white, smooth but mildly bumpy, and thicker than the typical subalpine fir.

The short but flattened needles whorl around the tree's twigs. They are dark green but covered...

(Compact Corkbark Fir, Corkbark Fir)

Unlike its parent, the spire-like subalpine fir, compact corkbark fir looks like a silvery green plump pyramid at maturity. A cone-bearing evergreen shrub with green needles that have a silver-blue cast, 'Compacta' was selected from trees native to the southern Rocky Mountains in Arizona and New Mexico in the American Southwest. Its rarely seen soft bark is gray to nearly white, smooth but mildly bumpy, and thicker than the typical subalpine fir.

The short but flattened needles whorl around the...

(Marie's Fir)

Look through the evergreen boughs of Marie's fir to see the ghostly white bark that often is blushed with purple hues. This conifer is a subalpine species native to the mid- and high elevations of the central Japanese island of Honshu. Although a pyramid when young, Marie's fir becomes more oval or flat-topped in silhouette at maturity. The bark is pale gray or brown with a powdery covering known as bloom, occasionally touched with hints of purple. Large, old trees display the ghostly white bole.

Young...

(Turkish Fir)

The Turkish fir is every bit like a Nordman fir except it doesn't mature nearly as large and has a greater tolerance to alkaline soils. Turkish fir grows naturally at high elevations in the mountains from roughly Athens, Greece to Istanbul, Turkey and the adjacent Bithynia region. Turkish fir essentially is an isolated population of Nordman firs that evolved and survived on cooler, northern-facing slopes in the region.

Turkish fir has an upright, narrow and columnar form with a partially rounded...

(Christmastree, Veitch Fir)

A handsome evergreen with deep green needles that curved upwards to reveal the silvery undersides, veitch fir also produces purplish cones. A tall conifer evergreen that is relatively fast-growing, it is native to central and southern Japan. Its smooth bark is sandy brown to gray in hue.

The non-prickly needles are short and glossy, dark green with silver to blue-green undersides. Needles densely line the branches' end twigs. Male and female cones are borne in late spring; the female cones become...