How to Identify Conifers - Page 5 of 10
By Ed Strauss, Washington (photos and content)

These (Figures 7 & 8) are photos of two more fossil wood specimens from the Pine Family in the tangential view at 100x. They both have some heterocellular rays that contain resin ducts. Their cell structure preservation is not as good as seen in Figures 5 & 6, they are more typical, Figure 6 is exceptionally well preserved. Figure 6 also has exceptionally large resin ducts which are unusual for a spruce type but the resin ducts in the transverse view (Figure 4) of the same specimen is certainly screaming "spruce type".

Figure 7

Figure 8

Now lets look at another group that can be differentiated. It contains some woods from the Bald Cypress Family (TAXODIACEAE). They have relatively large tracheids, no regular resin ducts and abundant parenchyma cells. All redwood, sequoia, metasequioia, and bald cypress genera have these features.

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