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Harmless🍽️ Edible

🌲 Swiss pine (Arolla pine)

Pinus cembra · Pinaceae

🏔️ Mountains
🧠 To remember it"Five for Cembro, two for Scots" — just counting the needles per bundle is enough to tell these two mountain pines apart.
Swiss pine (Arolla pine) — Pinus cembra

🔍 Identify it without mistakes

Massive conifer with a pyramidal shape becoming spreading with age, reaching up to 25 m. Needles grouped in clusters of 5 (fascicles), long, thin, slightly twisted, remaining on the tree for 3 to 4 years. Upright, ovoid cones that do not open on their own at maturity — they are broken open by the spotted nutcracker, a bird with which the Swiss pine shares a mutually dependent relationship for seed dispersal.

  1. needles grouped in 5s (unlike Scots pine, which has 2)
  2. upright cone that does not open on its own, broken open by the nutcracker
  3. smooth grey bark on young trees, becoming fissured with age
  4. found exclusively at very high alpine altitudes
Size15-25 m
FloweringJune (pollination), mature cones after 2-3 years
Habitatupper tree line (1500-2700 m), mainly inner Alps, rarer in the Pyrenees

⚠️ Not to be confused with

European yew (Taxus baccata)deadly — taxine alkaloids in the needles and seeds (only the red flesh of the aril is non-toxic); yew also grows in the mountains, sometimes in the understory of the same alpine forests as the Swiss pine

To tell them apart: Swiss pine has needles grouped in bundles of five and bears upright cones broken open by the nutcracker; yew has flat, ungrouped needles arranged in two flat rows along the twig, never bears cones (red arils instead), and often has a spreading shrubby habit rather than a tall pyramidal conifer shape

🍽️ Eating it

Partsseeds (pine nuts) from the mature cone
SeasonSeptember-October (harvest of fallen or cracked cones)
Tasterich, resinous, close to Mediterranean pine nuts but more aromatic

Preparation : extract the seeds from the cone, shell them, then eat them raw or lightly toasted

🪓 Other bushcraft uses

  • soft, aromatic wood highly sought after in traditional alpine woodworking (chalets, furniture) for its scent, which is said to repel moths
Sources (2)

No entry replaces a certain identification in the field, or medical advice. When in doubt: don't eat it. If ingestion is suspected: poison control or 112/911.