Chinese Douglas Fir

A vulnerable species. The timber is used for construction, bridge building, furniture, and wood fiber.

Trees to 50 m tall; trunk to 1 m d.b.h.; bark gray or dark gray, irregularly and thickly scaly; branchlets initially pale yellow or yellowish gray, aging gray, usually glabrous or slightly pubescent on main branchlets and densely pubescent on lateral branchlets. Leaves pectinately arranged, linear, (1.3-)2-2.5(-3) cm × ca. 2 mm, stomatal bands abaxial, whitish or gray-green, base broadly cuneate, apex emarginate. Seed cones pale purple, glaucous, maturing purplish brown, ovoid to ellipsoid- or conical-ovoid, 3.5-8 × 2-4.5 cm. Seed scales at middle of cones semiorbicular, flabellate, or reniform, 2.5-3 × 3.2-4.5 (-5) cm, rusty brown pubescent abaxially, base broadly cuneate or almost truncate, concave at sides. Bracts reflexed, cusp narrowly triangular, ca. 3 mm, apex obtuse. Seeds irregularly brown spotted abaxially, triangular-ovoid, slightly depressed, densely rusty brown pubescent adaxially; wing obliquely ovate or semitrullate. Pollination Apr, seed maturity Oct-Nov.

S Anhui, N Fujian, N Guizhou, W Hubei, NW Hunan, NE Jiangxi, S Shaanxi, SE Sichuan, Taiwan, C and NE Yunnan, Zhejiang

* Hills, mountains, evergreen broad-leaved forests; 600-2800 (-3300) m.

Pseudotsuga sinensis (Chinese Douglas-fir; in Chinese 黃杉, pinyin romanization: huáng shān) is a species of conifer in the family Pinaceae. It is a tree up to 50 metres tall. It is found in China (in Anhui, Fujian, Guangxi, Guizhou, Hubei, Hunan, Jiangxi, Shaanxi, Sichuan, Yunnan, and Zhejiang provinces) and Taiwan as well as in northernmost parts of Vietnam.

The timber is used for construction, bridge building, furniture, and wood fiber.

Pseudotsuga sinensis var. wilsoniana, Taiwan Douglas-fir, is sometimes treated as its own species, Pseudotsuga wilsoniana. This variety is geographically isolated (being restricted to Taiwan) but is not markedly distinct morphologically from var. sinensis of China.