Concept
Larix laricina, commonly known as the tamarack, hackmatack, eastern larch, black larch, red larch, or American larch, is a species of larch native to Canada, from eastern Yukon and Inuvik, Northwest Territories east to Newfoundland, and also south into the upper northeastern United States from Minnesota to Cranesville Swamp, West Virginia; there is also an isolated population in central Alaska. The word akemantak is an Algonquian name for the species and means "wood used for snowshoes". Larix laricina is a small to medium-size boreal coniferous and deciduous tree reaching tall, with a trunk up to diameter. Tamaracks and larches (Larix species) are deciduous conifers. The bark is tight and flaky, pink, but under flaking bark it can appear reddish. The leaves are needle-like, short, light blue-green, turning bright yellow before they fall in the autumn, leaving the pale pinkish-brown shoots bare until the next spring. The needles are produced spirally on long shoots and in dense clusters on long woody spur shoots. The cones are the smallest of any larch, only long, with 12-25 seed scales; they are bright red, turning brown and opening to release the seeds when mature, 4 to 6 months after pollination. Key characteristics: The needles are normally borne on a short shoot in groups of 10–20 needles. The larch is deciduous and the needles turn yellow in autumn. The seed cones are small, less than long, with lustrous brown scales. Larch are commonly found in swamps, fens, bogs, and other low-land areas. Tamaracks are very cold tolerant, able to survive temperatures down to at least , and commonly occurs at the Arctic tree line at the edge of the tundra. Trees in these severe climatic conditions are smaller than farther south, often only tall. They can tolerate a wide range of soil conditions but grow most commonly in swamps, bogs, or muskegs, in wet to moist organic soils such as sphagnum, peat, and woody peat. They are also found on mineral soils that range from heavy clay to coarse sand; thus texture does not seem to be limiting.
