Table Mountain pine, Pinus pungens, also called hickory pine, prickly pine, or mountain pine, is a small pine native to the Appalachian Mountains in the United States.
Pinus pungens is a tree of modest size (6–12 m), and has a rounded, irregular shape. The needles are in bundles of two, occasionally three, yellow-green to mid green, fairly stout, and 4–7 cm long. The pollen is released early compared to other pines in the area which minimizes hybridization. The cones are very short-stalked (almost sessile), ovoid, pale pinkish to yellowish buff, and 4–9 cm long; each scale bears a stout, sharp spine 4–10 mm long. Sapling trees can bear cones in a little as 5 years.
Buds ovoid to cylindric, red-brown, 0.6-0.9 cm, resinous.
