Pitch Pine AKA Candlewood

Pitch pine (Pinus rigada) is the emblematic tree of the Albany Pine Bush Preserve. Their bent and twisting silhouette is unlike any other tree here.

When early European settlers came to North America, they didn’t have the usual tallow and wax that they had traditionally lit their homes with back in Europe. Luckily for them, they were able to find a helpful resource in the pitch pine tree.

Pitch pine, known to the settlers as “candlewood pine,” produces a sticky resin called pitch to heal wounds and form protection when the bark and wood is damaged. Pitch collects where the pitch pine branches meet the trunk, forming "pine knots," resin-soaked pieces of wood. The settlers were able to burn these resinous pine knots for illumination. They used shivers (splinters of wood) as torches and melted the resin into containers as candles.

While lighting the night was one of the first uses of this amazing resinous tree, later in the 17^th century New England colonists started producing pine tar from pitch pine. The tar was crucial for shipbuilding as a preservative that helped make the planks of the ship water-tight. Tar was made by burning pitch pine logs, stumps, and deadwood in an earthen kiln. A sloped gutter at the bottom of the kiln directed the oozing tar to a collection barrel. One cord of pitch pine could yield roughly 40 to 60 gallons of tar.

More fun facts:

• Pitch pine do well in poor soil conditions, and thrive in the sandy nutrient-poor soil of the Albany Pine Bush Preserve. While they do not tolerate shade, they are adapted to surviving reoccurring wildland fire.
• Pitch pine have a symbiotic relationship with a fungus. Known as a "mycorrhizal" relationship, the tree and fungus work together benefiting one another.
• Their rigid and slightly twisted needles grow in clusters of three unlike the soft droopy needles of a white pine that grow in clusters of five.