red spruce

4.6

A medium-sized tree with needles whose wood is used for building and paper

noun
/rɛd sprus/

: picea roja

The lumber industry values red spruce for its strength and durability in constructing furniture.
red spruce forests

Examples

Red spruce and balsam fir are the major species here.

Academic text (1998)
Common trees are red spruce and balsam fir, interspersed with such broad-leaved species as American beech and sugar maple.

Academic text (1998)
Note the one-sided red spruce, a result of the frequent winter storms that approach from the west.

Academic text (2001)
Core estimates that the red spruce forests in West Virginia originally covered 469,000 acres.

Academic text (1990)
A short trail from the parking area passes through a forest dominated by red spruce and white pine to pastoral Falls Pond.

Academic text (1998)
On the highest peaks (or knobs, as West Virginians call them) grew nearly pure stands of red spruce.

Academic text (1990)
A trail along the lower reaches of the brook passes through a forest of red spruce, balsam fir, and paper birch.

Academic text (1998)
The Rail 'n' River Trail is an easy half-mile loop through a forest of red spruce, balsam fir, and northern hardwoods.

Academic text (1998)
In addition to balsam fir, they often host red spruce, white spruce, mountain ash, and heart-leaved paper birch.

Academic text (1998)
The Kancamagus Highway reaches its high point at a mountain pass, where most of the forest consists of red spruce and balsam fir, with scattered heart-leaved paper birches.

Academic text (1998)

Synonyms

Picea rubens

vsred spruce

Specialized

9.6

A medium-sized spruce tree from eastern North America that people use for timber and paper

is the common English name used for that species

eastern spruce

vsred spruce

4.6

A medium-sized evergreen tree from eastern North America that people use for wood and paper

is the widely used standard common name rather than the regional form

Surface Forms

red spruce singular

red spruces plural

Morphology

red + spruce

The compound 'red spruce' is directly compositional: 'red' (a color) modifies 'spruce' (a type of tree), so a learner who knows both words will infer it denotes a variety or type of spruce characterized by 'red'. This color + noun pattern is cross-linguistically common, so the basic meaning (a kind of spruce tree) is immediately understandable even if specific botanical details are not.

Etymology

The name red spruce may come from the tree's slightly reddish wood and young twigs. People used the word red to tell this kind of spruce apart from other spruces, so the name came to mean this particular 'tree'.