Abies nordmanniana (Steven) Spach

Abies nordmanniana subsp. nordmanniana at Eastnor Castle, Herefordshire. The regular, narrowly columnar crown of old trees is distinctive. January 2020. Image Tom Christian.

Abies nordmanniana subsp. nordmanniana at Ardkinglas Woodland Garden, Argyll, Scotland. April 2022. Image Tom Christian.

Another typically narrow Abies nordmanniana subsp. nordmanniana at the head of the Sequoiadendron avenue at Benmore Botanic Garden in Argyll, Scotland. September 2020. Image Tom Christian.

The contrasting habits of Abies alba (left, behind) and A. nordmanniana (this tree 38 m tall in May 2017) at Holne Chase, Devon, UK. Image Owen Johnson.

A typically shapely Abies nordmanniana 43 m tall at Dunans, Argyll, UK; May 2015. Image Owen Johnson.

Abies nordmanniana is perhaps the most reliable shapely of big silver firs in north-west Europe. South Devon, April 2013. Image Owen Johnson.

Abies nordmanniana growing as an exceptionally shapely young tree at Grayswood Hill, Surrey, UK; September 2010. Image Owen Johnson.

The foliage of Abies nordmanniana subsp. nordmanniana is held in distinctive sprays. A proportion of the needles are swept forwards above the shoot, more or less obscuring it. This example is from a mature tree of unknown origin at Murthly Castle, Perthshire, UK, June 2020. Image Tom Christian.

Abies nordmanniana subsp. nordmanniana shoot undersides on a tree of TDI 95 growing at Murthly Castle, Perthshire, UK. Photographed June 2020. Image Tom Christian.

One of England's largest Abies nordmanniana at Stourhead, Wiltshire. July 2025. Image Aidan Champion.

Abies nordmanniana.

Branchlet with pubescence in the grooves, and non-resinous buds on Abies nordmanniana (Arboretum Het Leen Eeklo, Belgium – 5 November 2014). Image © Jan De Langhe - Arboretum Wespelaar.

Foliage below shoot on Abies nordmanniana (Arboretum Het Leen Eeklo, Belgium – 5 November 2014). Image © Jan De Langhe - Arboretum Wespelaar.

Leaves apically emarginate, with a few stomata, obscuring the branchlet on Abies nordmanniana (Arboretum Het Leen Eeklo, Belgium – 5 November 2014). Image © Jan De Langhe - Arboretum Wespelaar.

Foliage above shoot on Abies nordmanniana at Arboretum Het Leen Eeklo, Belgium (5 November 2014). Image © Jan De Langhe - Arboretum Wespelaar.

Dwarf Cultivars

Just as with Abies alba, the familiar and long-grown Nordmann Fir has given rise to a multitude of cultivars, including a large number of dwarf selections. Perhaps because its native range is in the Caucasus rather than in Europe these are fewer in number than is the case with European Silver Fir; listing a selection of the most important is, consequently, not such an impossible task as it is for A. alba. Elsewhere in this account of the genus the catch-all term ‘dwarf cultivars’ is taken to mean, typically, <3 m in ten years. Seveal of the cultivars treated separately under A. nordmanniana fall into this category; these have been afforded individual treatments on accout of their distinctiveness. The following are all, except perhaps in the eyes of dedicated specialists, very similar indeed. All are extreme dwarfs (i.e. < 1 × 1 m in ten years) unless otherwise stated:

• ‘Barabits Compact’ A low mat-forming selection raised in Hungary in 1985
• ‘Brandt’ Selected in the US, in ten years to 1.5 × 1.2 m
• ‘Brevifolia’ An old selection raised in France before 1867, contorted branchlets and leaves
• ‘Dahlheim’ (‘Berlin’, ‘Eschrich’) Of compact, globose habit, raised in Germany
• ‘Dobřichovice’ Compact pyramidal form of dense growth, raised from a witches’ broom found in Czechia in 1998. The needles are assurgent revelaing silvery undersides in a manner similar to some A. koreana selections
• ‘Durham Dwarf’ A dwarf pyramidal selection raised in the USA
• ‘Eschrich’s Variegated’ Raised in Germany in the early 2000s this cultivar is a slow-growing upright plant, with some leaves fully yellow, others green and yellow
• ‘Horizontalis’ An old French cultivar of very low, spreading, compact habit
• ‘Jakobsen’ A witches’ broom discovered in Denmark, this is a minute, prostrate selection growing only 2–3 cm per year
• ‘Jensen’ A pendulous selection of Danish origin, ultimately several metres tall
• ‘KBNG’ (‘Hunnewell Broom’, ‘Broom H’) A witches’ broom found on the Hunnewell estate in Massachusetts in the 1990s. It forms a low-growing mound of very dense, incredibly slow growth
• ‘Midwinter Gold’ Pyramidal selection with yellowish leaves through summer, turning a warm golden-yellow in winter
• ‘Petra’ A miniature of irregular habit and exceedingly slow growth
• ‘Pere Hasselt’ Similar to ‘Petra’, but perhaps twice as fast
• ‘Procumbens’ ’Procumbens’, an aptly named selection forming a wide-spreading mat, faster and ultimately larger than many listed here, to 30 × 150 cm in ten years. Raised at the Korník Arboretum in Poland in 1834
• ‘Saerling’ A very compact pyramidal form selected in the Netherlands in the 1990s, perhaps to 1.5 m or more in ten years
• ‘Schwarzgrun’ A slow-growing pyramidal tree to 2 m in ten years
• ‘Secrest’ Propagated from a witches’ broom found at the Secrest Arboretum, Ohio, in the 1990s, but otherwise an unremarkable dwarf shrub of globose habit and average growth
• ‘Silberspitze’ Shrubby selection growing broader than tall, with creamy-white growth in the spring, darkening by autumn
• ‘Trautmann’ A narrowly pyramidal tree of upright growth and average vigour, raised in Ohio
• ‘Verkades Prostrate’ A mat-forming selection of perhaps above-average vigour for a leaderless selection, to 1 m across in ten years

(Auders & Spicer 2012; Hatch 2021–2022).

'Golden Spreader'

A widely grown and variable entity. In its formative years, ‘Golden Spreader’ forms a low, spreading shrub of dense growth with good foliage colour throughout the seasons, up to 50 × 100 cm after ten years. Some well-established plants develop a leader and slowly form a dense, compact pyramid of yellowish foliage perhaps 2 or 3 metres tall given time. Like many yellow-leaved plants it benefits from some light shade in hotter regions (Auders & Spicer 2012). First found as a seedling in S.N. Schoots Nursery, the Netherlands, in 1961, it has almost completely replaced ‘Aurea’ which was always scarce, and which lacks the low, spreading character of this clone in youth (Auders & Spicer 2012).

Abies nordmanniana 'Gold Spreader': having escaped its youthful spreading habit this cultivar can become a beautiful golden column (Kilworth Conifers, Leicestershire, UK. March 2022). Image John Grimshaw.

Abies nordmanniana 'Gold Spreader': a young pot-grown plant (Kilworth Conifers, March 2022). Image John Grimshaw.

Abies nordmanniana 'Golden Spreader' behaving as advertised. Image Derek Spicer.

A well-placed erect Abies nordmanniana 'Gold Spreader' at RHS Garden Wisley, UK (April 2023). Image John Grimshaw.

'Pendula'

It is interesting that of the various weeping firs, only those selected from European or west Asian species have attracted high praise (e.g. A. alba ‘Pendula’). Several pendulous cultivars have been selected from North American species, but these are mostly dwarfs, and those that are not have never gained the popularity of their European counterparts. Pendulous forms of Nordmann Fir have arisen several times in cultivation, but those that remain in commerce seem all to be the same, traceable to Young’s nursery in Surrey, UK, where it was selected before 1874. It is a somewhat irregular plant: it may form a leader with ease and without help, or require rather a lot of encouragement. Once established, though, A. nordmanniana ‘Pendula’ combines an almost exaggeratedly pendulous habit with good vigour (Auders & Spicer 2012). One example at the Sir Harold Hillier Gardens had reached 14 m by 2014, when aged nearly 40 (Tree Register 2021).

The ‘Pendula’ discussed by Hatch (Hatch 2021–2022) is a different clone. His accompanying illustration of a page from Revue Horticole of 1890 tells us this is the form found and propagated by the French nurseryman Courtois in 1869. This is “more cascading than overtly drooping” (Hatch 2021–2022) and it isn’t clear whether any trees representing Courtois’s plant are still extant. If so they are exceedingly rare, and were logic the only consideration in such matters, they would be renamed in favour of the more widespread clone described above. Until we know it is still in existence the problem is academic.

Abies nordmanniana 'Pendula' at Sir Harold Hillier Gardens, UK. July 2003. Image Derek Spicer.

'Robusta'

An unusual, fast-growing selection. It is sparsely branched, and the branches are quite short; the leaves are peculiarly incurved above the shoot, still obviously A. nordmanniana but quite different from the normal foliage form. Raised from seed by Sénécaluze in 1864 (Auders & Spicer 2012). A tree at Bedgebury National Pinetum, UK, had seed cones with the bracts not so prominently exserted as the typical species (pers. obs. 2020).

Grafted specimens of Abies nordmanniana 'Robusta' (left and right) within a group of Nordmann Firs in Bedgebury National Pinetum, UK. Their vigour has been average for this species at this site, with the two trees 11 m tall after 27 years' growth in August 2024. Image Owen Johnson.

subsp. equi-trojani (Asch. & Sint. ex Boiss.) Coode & Cullen

The Trojan Horse Fir – one of the more imaginatively named members of the genus – may owe its moniker to the fact that the populations from which it was originally described occur only about 60 km as the crow flies from the ancient city of Troy. An alternative theory, mooted by Tony Schilling in conversation with Lawrence Banks, goes that it is so named because when struck with a hammer it rattles… (W.L. Banks pers. comm. 2019). From typical A. nordmanniana it may be distinguished by its (usually) longer leaves, less densely set on the shoot and more radially arranged, neither so strongly forwards nor incurved above, their whitish undersides apparent at eye level without having to turn the shoots over. The prominent patch of stomata on the upper surface of the needles, near their blunt tips, help to distinguish it further, including from its other near neighbours the Greek and Bulgarian Firs (respectively A. cephalonica and A. borisii-regis).

According to Liu (1971) it was discovered ‘in the year 1883 by the Greek botanist P. Sintenis on the northern slope of the highest peak on Mount Ida’ (one of two sacred mountains to bear the name in Greek mythology, this Turkish one is now Kaz Daği while the other is on Crete, where no firs are native). It was described the next year as a variety of A. alba, later elevated to species rank in 1925, then treated as a subspecies of A. nordmanniana in volume 1 of the Flora of Turkey (Coode & Cullen 1965), which followed the prevailing view that it was a relatively narrow endemic occurring only in the Kaz Daği mountains north of the city of Edremit, in Turkey’s Aegean region. The same work treated the population some 100 km north east, on Uludağ, and those further east in the Köroğlu Dağari, as A. nordmanniana subsp. bornmuelleriana. A tour through conifer literature reveals a great deal of confusion around and between the firs that exist on either side of the Aegean Sea and in northern Anatolia. The names bornmuelleriana and equi-trojani are inexorably linked with this confusion, and as elements of it have persisted until relatively recently, it seems sensible to attempt to disentangle the various threads.

Elwes and Henry stated that Guiniere and Maire found ‘Abies nordmanniana…growing on Mount Olympus in Bithynia’ in 1904 (Elwes & Henry 1906–1913). One hundred years hence this use of the classical name Mount Olympus is potentially confusing, for it is of course best known to us now as the seat of the Gods and the highest mountain in Greece, however, Elwes and Henry refer quite clearly to ‘Mount Olympus in Bithynia’. Bithynia was a Roman province in modern day northern Turkey, immediately east of the Sea of Marmara, and the Bithynian Olympus is known today as Uludağ, and so it is clear that the Fir Guiniere and Maire found in 1904 was that which was distinguished up until fairly recently under various permutations of the name bornmuelleriana (e.g. Debreczy & Rácz 2011). This fir was first described as distinct (as A. bornmuelleriana) in 1925, so when Elwes and Henry penned their remarkable work they would not have had any reason to distinguish the Ulludağ populations. What is particularly interesting is that at no point in their account do they suppose that the western Anatolian populations are allied to species across the Aegean, they believe they belong to A. nordmanniana, pre-empting the Flora of Turkey treatment by half a century and evidence perhaps of just how shrewd a botanist Augustine Henry was.

Soon after the publication of the first volume of the Flora of Turkey, however, Liu (1971) proposed quite a different take on matters. In early literature the fir on the Greek Mount Olympus was taken, quite reasonably, to be A. cephalonica, the Greek Fir. It is now considered to represent A. borisii-regis (see that account for further discussion of Greek populations) but for a while these populations, and those on Mount Parnassus, were treated as the Apollo Fir; A. cephalonica var. apollinis. In his 1971 Monograph Liu resurrected an older name, graeca, for the Apollo Fir in a new combination; A. cephalonica var. graeca (Fraas) Liu, and, finding the Trojan Horse Fir ‘botanically…identical’ he placed it into synonymy with his new var. graeca, and in so doing he recognised a Pan-Aegean Fir (Liu 1971). In the same work Liu concluded that the taxon circumscribed under the name bornmuelleriana was a hybrid, and he amended the name to a nothospecies, A. × bornmuelleriana, suggesting it represented a merging of A. cephalonica to the west and A. nordmanniana s.s. to the east. (Presumably Liu thought that equi-trojani, implicit in his cephalonica var. graeca, must have been involved for this is the closest fir geographically to populations of bornmuelleriana, but he doesn’t specify, nor does he address the fact that the nearest Bulgarian populations of borisii-regis, which he recognises, are no more distant from bornmuelleriana than mainland Greek populations of cephalonica).

It may be seen that Liu’s taxonomy of this group of firs is distinctly flawed; the Flora of Turkey approach has generally been favoured, but of course there are exceptions. Bean (1976) seems to err closer to Liu than to the Flora of Turkey, agreeing that equi-trojani appears closer to cephalonica, and pointing out that ‘since A. nordmanniana and A. cephalonica have both been grown in western Europe for well over a century, trees resembling A. bornmuelleriana might be hybrids of cultivated origin’ (Bean 1976) but this theory apparently ignores the presence of extensive wild populations in northern Turkey. Krüssmann (1985) treated all three Anatolian Firs at species rank, as did Rushforth (1987) who pointed out that the hybrid origin theory for bornmuelleriana ‘does not accord’ with the morphological characters of wild trees. The Flora of Turkey approach was adopted by Farjon (1990) with the amendment that he did not consider bornmuelleriana distinct from equi-trojani, whereas in their recent work Debreczy & Rácz (2011) characteristically afford species rank to both, but their descriptions of bornmuelleriana and equi-trojani contain inconsistencies regarding characters they say are useful in separating them. Farjon (2017) continues to justify merging them based on overlapping character states. Liu’s approach has persevered in some quarters until relatively recently, for example Jacobson (1996) follows his taxonomy, and his circumscriptions may occasionally be met with on labels in old collections.

New Trees followed Farjon (1990) in sinking bornmuelleriana into equi-trojani and reported on several specimens both in Europe and North America (Grimshaw & Bayton 2009), however, the statement that ‘The largest known in cultivation in the British Isles is a 22.5 m tall tree (dbh 60 cm) at Rowallane, Co. Down, measured in 2000’ is erroneous, for there are multiple records of trees comfortably exceeding 30 m in the UK and Ireland going back to 1980 (Tree Register 2020). Indeed, the tallest on record is a tree measured in 1992 at Fulmodesten Severals, Norfolk, at 37 m tall, while another at Fota, Cork, was 35 m in 1984. The tallest known to be extant in the UK and Ireland at the time of writing (spring 2020) is a 35 m tree at Bicton Park Botanical Gardens, Devon. (Tree Register 2020).

Several introductions have been made in recent years, including TURX 20 which is represented at UK collections including Kew, Wakehurst Place, and the Yorkshire Arboretum, from collections made on Uludağ in 1990. The Royal Botanic Garden Edinburgh’s TDI expedition of 2005 also introduced material from the same mountain (as A. nordmanniana subsp. bornmuelleriana) under numbers 232, 233, 235, and 236. The TDI collections yielded large numbers of plants and these have been extensively distributed in the UK and Ireland under the auspices of the International Conifer Conservation Programme. Several institutions that received these TDI collections now treat them as equi-trojani, for example Bedgebury and Westonbirt. Curiously, a EUFORGEN report includes a distribution map which clearly shows the populations on Kaz Daği and Uludağ identified as equi-trojani, while the populations in the Köroğlu Dağari continue to be identified as bornmuelleriana (Alizoti et al. 2011).

It remains a point of curiosity that despite the eastern populations extending into the Köroğlu Dağari to approximately 36° east, few significant seed introductions under the name bornmuelleriana come from further east than the locus classicus of Uludağ. One exception is TURX 109, collected in native forest near the city of Bolu, in the Province of the same name. This material is also well represented in UK collections, including at the Howick Arboretum, but otherwise all known-origin material is traceable to Uludağ. Could this narrow sampling have skewed species concepts in horticulture? In the herbarium at Edinburgh Coode and Cullen verified specimens as belonging to their A. nordmanniana subsp. bornmuelleriana well distributed through the Köroğlu Dağari, in Bolu (E00236909), Kastamanu (E00236902), Sinup (E00236907), and Samsun (E00236908) Provinces, yet no documented living plants have yet been found traceable to this part of the range except TURX 109 from Bolu. It would be interesting to know whether, in deciding to synonymise bornmuelleriana with equi-trojani, Farjon considered material from the the Köroğlu Dağari or just material from the locus classicus.

Certainly, cultivated material from the Kaz Daği and Uludağ populations is more or less impossible to separate without the cheat-sheet of provenance data, which supports Farjon’s decision to sink bornmuelleriana, as do the results of Knees (2011), who found that material from the two localities cannot be distinguished genetically . However, there are forms in cultivation that appear intermediate between the Kaz Daği/Uludağ populations, and populations of subsp. nordmanniana in the far north east of Turkey, but because the name bornmuelleriana is based on the Uludağ material, this name cannot be used for the intermediate Köroğlu Dağari populations even if these are considered to warrant taxonomic distinction, an approach clearly inherent in the EUFORGEN report of Alizoti et al. (2011). Further research is needed to determine whether the Köroğlu Dağari populations do indeed merit distinction from those of Kaz Daği and Uludağ, which, in turn, do not merit distinction from one another.

If this turns out to be the case Köroğlu Dağari populations will need a new name, for the name bornmuelleriana should now be rendered a pro parte synonym of equi-trojani and its continued use would be misleading. Regarding the Köroğlu Dağari populations as an ecotype may be appropriate (a possibility long mooted for A. cilicica subsp. isaurica, for example), as the climate south of the Sea of Marmara is decidedly more Mediterranean than that of the Köroğlu Dağari (S. Knees pers. comm. 2020).

Abies nordmanniana subsp. equi-trojani seed cones, on a tree of TURX 109 growing at the Howick Arboretum, Northumberland. Photographed 07 July 2020. Image Tom Christian.

Vegetative shoots of Abies nordmanniana subsp. equi-trojani on a tree of TDI 235 at Murthly Castle, Perthshire, UK. The needles are less densely set and more upright above the shoots compared to subsp. nordmanniana. June 2020. Image Tom Christian.

Underside of vegetative shoots of Abies nordmanniana subsp. equi-trojani, on a tree of TDI 235 at Murthly Castle, Perthshire, UK, June 2020. Image Tom Christian.

Vegetative shoots of Abies nordmanniana subsp. equi-trojani, on a tree of TDI 235, collected as seed on Uludağ, Turkey, autumn 2005. Note the broken lines of stomata near the needle tips. Photographed at Murthly Castle, Perthshire, UK, June 2020. Image Tom Christian.

Abies nordmanniana subsp. equi-trojani forest. Uludağ, Turkey, autumn 2005. Image Martin Gardner.

Abies nordmanniana subsp. equi-trojani seed cones. Uludağ, Turkey, autumn 2005. Image Martin Gardner.

An old tree of Abies nordmanniana subsp. equi-trojani at Bicton Park Botanical Gardens, Devon, UK. October 2020. Image Tom Christian.

Trees of TURX 109 at the Howick Arboretum, Northumberland. This is the only gathering known from UK collections traceable to the Köroğlu Dağari in northern Turkey. These populations were circumscribed under the name subsp. bornmuelleriana by the Flora of Turkey, but these days they tend to be included within subsp. equi-trojani. Photographed 07 July 2020. Image Tom Christian.

A superb Trojan Horse Fir (Abies nordmanniana subsp. equi-trojani) aged about 30 years. Hergest Croft, Herefordshire, UK. September 2019. Image Tom Christian.

One of the few mature specimens of Abies nordmanniana subsp. equi-trojani, 35 m tall in 2013 when this photograph was taken, was planted in 1916 at the Bicton Park Botanical Gardens, Devon. Image Owen Johnson.

This specimen of Abies nordmanniana subsp. equi-trojani (labelled Abies bornmuelleriana) has unusually reddish branchlets, a feature often given by authors but rarely seen in cultivation. Sir Harold Hillier Gardens, Hampshire, UK. August 2020. Image Brian Robertshaw.

Abies nordmanniana subsp. equi-trojani, planted in 1960 from seed of unrecorded provenance, has been one of the most successful species in the experimental Forest Plots at Bedgebury National Pinetum, UK. The soil at this particular location is intensely acid and nutrient deficient, and this stand withstood, largely intact, the Great Storm of October 1987 which flattened most of the adjoining plots. By July 2024 the best trees in this group were 27 m tall. Image Owen Johnson.

'Tortifolia'

A selection which, based on descriptions in literature, represents almost exactly the same variation as ‘Robusta’, but with a different origin, having been found in one Mrs Cuttery’s garden in New York during the 1920s (Auders & Spicer 2012). Bean (1976) reported a tree over 30 m at Belladrum near Inverness, Scotland.