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Larch, or tamarack: the conifer that turns gold and drops its needles

October to November

Larch, also called tamarack, is the only native New England conifer that turns colour and sheds every needle each autumn, then stands bare all winter. It goes gold from the middle of October into early November, once the maples have finished.

Why this time of year

UNH Extension calls it the third and final foliage spectacle of the New England season, beginning in mid-October and running into early November. A tree that still has the shape of a conifer but glows gold against a bare landscape is almost certainly a larch.

How to notice it

  1. Native tamarack here is a bog and fen specialist rather than a tree of ordinary woods, so pick a bog with a boardwalk. Pine Hole Bog at Ward Reservation, 65 Prospect Road, Andover, has a 700 foot boardwalk across a kettlehole bog ringed with black spruce and tamarack. It is a 40 minute drive from Sudbury and there is a parking fee for non-members.
  2. The closer option is planted larch. The Arnold Arboretum in Boston has a grove of larches just inside the Walter Street Gate at the south end of Conifer Path, and it is nearer to Sudbury than Andover is.
  3. Confirm it by the needles: soft and pale, in tufts of ten or more growing from short woody knobs along older twigs, not in bundles of two to five like a pine. Current-year shoots carry single needles instead, so check an older branch.
  4. Come back in winter and find the same tree bare. Small upright cones stay on the naked branches, which is how you find a larch again in January.

Try this with kids: Pick one tuft of needles and count them. Can you get past ten? Now find the little woody bump it grows out of.

a deciduous conifer is a cone-bearing tree that drops all its needles every autumn instead of staying green

Safety

  • A quaking bog is a floating mat of peat and moss over open water. Stay on the boardwalk and do not step off onto the moss, however solid it looks.
  • Larch grows in wet ground, so expect soggy footing at any bog edge.

Sources

  • extension.unh.eduUNH Extension, the New England timing source this entry now rests on: the tamarack display begins mid-October and runs into early November, after the maples, as the third and final foliage spectacle of the season. Also the field mark of clusters of 10 to 25 needles on short spurs of older branches, with single needles on the current year's growth.
  • gobotany.nativeplanttrust.orgNative Plant Trust: Larix laricina is native to Massachusetts and ranked S5, occurs in bogs and fens and usually in wetlands, and is the only NEW ENGLAND NATIVE conifer to drop its needles in autumn and grow new ones in spring.
  • research.fs.usda.govUSDA Forest Service: a native deciduous conifer whose needles turn yellow before being shed; in the northeastern United States characteristically found in open and forested bogs and on cold, wet, poorly drained sites; needles in clusters of 10 to 20 on dwarf twigs; erect mature cones about half to three quarters of an inch. Its 'late September or early October' timing is attributed to WISCONSIN, with Minnesota and Michigan figures alongside, so it is a Lake States figure and not a range-wide one.
  • thetrustees.orgThe Trustees: the 700 foot boardwalk across a kettlehole level bog, and 'the trees around you are black spruce (Picea mariana) and American larch or tamarack (Larix laricina)'.
  • thetrustees.orgThe Trustees: Charles W. Ward Reservation, 65 Prospect Road, Andover; open daily 7am to sunset; members free with a parking fee for non-members.
  • thetrustees.orgThe Trustees: 'A short walk from the parking lot brings you to Pine Hole Pond via the Bog Trail, which is 0.6 mile roundtrip.' This is the correct home of the 0.6 mile figure, which is not on either of the two pages the entry originally cited it to.
  • arboretum.harvard.eduArnold Arboretum: 'The south entry for Conifer Path begins just inside Walter Street Gate, amid a grove of larch trees (Larix spp.)'.
  • research.fs.usda.govUSDA Forest Service: European larch is planted as an ornamental in the northeastern United States, grows larger than American larch and tolerates warmer sites, and has naturalised in several New England states. This is why the entry says only NATIVE conifer.

Checked against these sources on September 6, 2026.

In the guide for October, November

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