Mice in the cones...

Greetings!

Thanks to two of our readers, we have a little information to supplement my post "Check out the size of those cones!" from October 07, 2005.

Here’s what the Arborealists have to say:

RMD tells us:

"…so in the little known facts department - the mice hanging out of the cones are brachts that are unique to Douglas Fir which really isn't a true fir. It's the common tree here in the lowlands [West of Cascades] that everyone calls fir but the scientific name is Psuedotsuga because the cone morphology is closer to Tsuga (Hemlocks). True firs are Abies - like the Alpine fir or the Grandfirs. In true firs the cones fall apart when they are ripe."

And many thanks to AND for filling in my memory gaps:

"If my memory serves me, the owl wanted to eat the mice & tricked them into in the cones by telling them that is where they'd be safe from the fire..."

Thanks guys!

And, for those of you who are unfamiliar with the Douglas Fir, here is a picture of a couple cones. Unfortunately, the closest Doug Firs are on the other side of the fence, and somehow I doubt the neighbors would believe that I was just collecting cones… so… this is a picture of an older cone specimen, likely from last year.