The best way to identify a Douglas fir — that ubiquitous American evergreen that, it turns out, is much more than a staple of the Christmas season — is to look at the cone. Not the “pine ...

Ponderosa pine and Douglas-fir forest in the Payette National Forest, Idaho, nine years after it burned in the 2007 East Zone Complex Fire. Disclaimer: AAAS and EurekAlert! are not responsible for ...

And you won’t get that evergreen Douglas fir smell — but Sam Van Leer, Urban Paradise Guild’s founder, suggests picking up cuttings or pine cones at a local tree shop to make up for that.