Hanging and about 6 cm long, green ripening brown, with a thin three-pointed strap poking out from under every scale.
Introduced · Up to 62 m
Douglas fir
Pseudotsuga menziesii · Pinaceae
Douglas fir is a tall, slender conifer. A thin three-pointed strap pokes out from under every scale of its hanging cones. Its soft needles smell sweet and fruity when crushed.
Often mistaken for grand fir. How to tell them apart →Know it byConesHanging, about 6 cm long, green ripening brown.
NeedlesSoft, set all round the shoot, two white bands underneath.BudsAbout 10 mm and pale brown, on finely hairy shoots.
ConesHanging, about 6 cm long, green ripening brown.NeedlesSoft, set all round the shoot, two white bands underneath.BudsAbout 10 mm and pale brown, on finely hairy shoots.Then check · BarkSmooth and grey with resin blisters when young. Later it is thick and corky, split by deep upright cracks that open orange.
How to identify a Douglas fir
Soft and flexible, set all round the shoot, with two white bands underneath and a sweet, fruity smell when crushed.
Slender pale brown buds, about 10 mm, taper to a fine point like a beech bud. The shoots are thin and finely hairy.
Learn the Douglas fir in TreelyEvery part through the year, and a short round each day until you know it.Get Treely
Every part, in photographs
jamie-aa, CC BY 4.0
Barry Walter, CC BY 4.0When to look
JFMAMJJASOND
In leaf
Flowers
Cones
In leaf: all year · Flowers: March to May · Cones: September to November
Where you’ll find it
Plantations, parks and sheltered glens, growing best in the wetter west and in Scotland. It rarely seeds itself. It needs a damp climate, with 700 to 2000 mm of rain a year. It suffers in exposed places and does badly on waterlogged or limy ground.
What it’s mistaken for
Douglas fir or grand fir?Both are big soft-needled conifers of western plantations, sweetly scented when crushed.Shoot from above→
Douglas fir or western hemlock?Both grow in the same wet plantations, with a similar spire.Size of a fallen cone→
Douglas fir or giant redwood?Both are huge estate conifers whose thick corky bark gives under a hand.Scales of a fallen cone→
- Noble firBoth are tall conifers with a spire and a long, clean trunk. Leaf. Douglas fir: dark green above, two white bands beneath. Noble fir: bluish grey on both faces.
- Sitka spruceBoth make towering timber stands in the wet west. Leaf. Douglas fir: soft and flexible, bending under the hand. Sitka spruce: stiff, and painfully sharp at the tips.
In the app
There’s more of the Douglas fir in Treely
- Every part, through the yearLeaves, bark, buds, flowers and fruit, photographed in every season
- Its lookalikes, side by sideThe checks that settle it, part by part
- A short round each dayUntil you know the Douglas fir on sight, from any side
- Name it from a photoA leaf, the bark or a flower, and Treely tells you which tree
Free to download.
Every fact on this page is checked against the Collins Tree Guide, last in November 2026. Spotted something that looks wrong in front of a real tree? Tell us. How we check.
Photographs: jamie-aa (CC BY 4.0), bobwardell (CC0), Barry Walter (CC BY 4.0), rockybajada (CC0), rambryum (CC0), Nicole (CC BY 4.0). With thanks to everyone who shares their photographs on iNaturalist and Wikimedia Commons.