pine and cedar tree

[Anonymous]

I want to plant pine and cedar trees behind my house to benefit the many beautiful songbirds that visit me everyday.Are there any that are native? I live in Marin County. THANK YOU</p>

[Anonymous]

Karen -

Your best source of info on locally native trees is the Marin Chapter of CNPS. You can reach them through the Local Chapters portion of the CNPS webpage.

In general, there are no true cedars in the US. Everything referred to as a cedar is a cypress, incense cedar, or other cedar-like tree. As for pines in Marin, the reference, THE DISTRIBUTION OF FOREST TREES IN CALIFORNIA by Griffen and Critchfield, shows the bishop pine, P. muricata, as native to Marin. This book is out of print and hard to find, but its maps are included in Ronald Lanners book on Conifers of California Cachuma Press - an excellent book.

There would probably be no harm in planing incense cedars in Marin, though one must remember that the birds got along for thousands of years in Marin with just the trees that are native there. in Lanner's book you can read about all the native California conifers and see which ones are native to your area. So, those are my 2 recommendations - get the conifer book and contact the Marin chapter of CNPS.

Good luck,

lori</p>