Pinus is bestus. Haha seriously though what is your favorite pine tree? My favorite is the Whitebark Pine (Pinus albicaulis), it is uncommon to my area and is associated with the introduced White Pine Blister Rust which has an uncommon life cycle involving the Ribes species. Very cool
All of them! Depends on the situation, whichever is native locally. In Scotland, you can't beat a good Scots Pine. In Bulgaria, Macedonian Pine and Bosnian Pine. Canary Island Pines on Tenerife are superb. California's White Mountains are a must to see the nearly-5,000 year old Great Basin Bristlecone Pines. But for the strangest pine of them all, head to northeast Mexico and seek out Nelson's Pinyon.
Yup Grim, I imagine Whitebark pine is uncommon in Edmonton, but I guess your area includes a couple of hundred miles west. Alberta Forest Service once told me that I could find them accessibly, meaning an old guy could walk up to them, on a ridge above Wasootch Creek in Kananaskis country. They looked like Limber pines (p. flexilis) to me, but I could be wrong. I'd have to say that Limber pine is my favourite, I have about three dozen survivors in the ground here in the Yukon, facing their second winter. I'm trying to substitute latitude for altitude. And if I can't get a p. pinea to grow outside, I'll make a bonsai out of some. Carl postscript: Believe it or not, I had to send to France for seed for a Rocky Mountain species. They're out of p. albicaulis, so if you can collect some for me I'd really like to try some of them too. Don't suppose you have a good connection to Clark's Nutcracker do you... And a second postscript: I'm with Michael F. I like all of 'em.
