摘要：Table Mountain pine (Pinus pungens Lambert) was historicallya widespread pine species native to the central and southernAppalachian Mountains, but, in recent decades, its currentnatural distribution has been reduced to less than 30,000 ac(12,000 ha). Reasons for this decline include wildfire suppressionprograms of the early 20th century, southern pine beetleoutbreaks,and recent climate fluctuations. Part of the effort tomitigate this decline is a 5-year, cooperative, genetic-resourceconservation effort being conducted by Camcore (InternationalTree Breeding and Conservation, North Carolina [NC] StateUniversity) and the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA),Forest Service, Southern Region National Forest System. Thegoal of the project was to target seed collections from up to300 mother trees in 30 populations distributed across the naturalrange of the species. During five field seasons, cones were col-lected from a total of 262 mother trees in 38 populations andyielded a total of 390,530 seeds. Seeds have been distributedto the USDA Agricultural Research Service-National Centerfor Genetic Resources Preservation for long-term storage, theUSDA Forest Service Ashe Nursery Facility for seed orchardand reforestation activities, and the Camcore Seed Bank forresearch and field plantings. Collectively, the seed stored atthese three facilities represents the largest genetic resource ofTable Mountain pine that exists outside of natural stands.
