The WOOD is light, soft, close-grained, and pale brown, used for fuel and sometimes as fencing. A close relative P. cembroides is found scattered in the Texas cedar breaks. PONDEROSA PINE (Western Yellow Pine) Pinus ponderosa Laws. Ponderosa pine is the most important commercial pine of the Southwest and many parts of the Rocky Mountain region. It reaches the southeastern limit of its range in the Guadalupe and Davis Mountains of West Texas where it is scattered and of little commercial value. It is favored as an ornamental in the Texas Panhandle. [Illustration: PONDEROSA PINE (Fruit and leaves, one-half natural size)] The needle-like LEAVES are in bundles of three and are mostly 5 to 8 inches long. The needles, massed toward the ends of naked branches, remain on the tree about 3 years. The “FRUIT”, a short-stalked cone, is oval-shaped, reddish-brown, and armed with stout recurved prickles. The WOOD of this species, from trees in the commercial part of its range, is of excellent quality for lumber. The wood is hard, strong, and rather fine grained. The heartwood is light reddish-white and the sapwood nearly white. Lumber from this tree is widely used for house construction and furniture. LOBLOLLY PINE Pinus taeda L. This fast-growing yellow pine is the most abundant and valuable species in Southeast Texas from Orange County west to Walker and Waller Counties. The species is also abundant northward to the Oklahoma line. Loblolly pine also constitutes the pine of the “Lost Pine Region” in the vicinity of Bastrop. [Illustration: LOBLOLLY PINE (Fruit and leaves, one-half natural size)] Loblolly invades abandoned fields rapidly. For this reason it is often called old field pine. In the virgin forest of Texas, loblolly pine was most common along banks of streams. It is still the dominant pine on moist sites, but may also be found in relatively dry sites. The dark-colored BARK is deeply furrowed and often attains a thickness of as much as 2 inches on large-sized trees. The needle-like LEAVES, 6 to 9 inches long, are borne three (occasionally two) in a cluster. In the spring bright green clumps of needles grow at the end of branches and give the tree a luxuriant appearance. The “FRUIT”, a cone, ripens in the autumn of the second year and is 3 to 5 inches long. Many seeds with wings an inch long are shed during the fall and early winter. The resinous WOOD is coarse-grained. There is marked contrast, as in other yellow pines, between the bands of springwood and summerwood. The wood of second-growth trees has a wide range of uses such as building material, box shooks, barrel staves, basket veneers, pulpwood, lath, mine props, piling, and fuel. SHORTLEAF PINE (Yellow Pine) Pinus echinata Mill.