Highly shade tolerant and fire intolerant.
Seed-bearing cones brown, small, the individual scales roundish.
Grows in moist soil. Common in narrow, shaded valleys, mostly in the mountain zone. A stand of unusually large trees grows in Swallow Falls State Park, on the Youghiogheny River in Garrett County (Brown and Brown, 1972). A number of these trees have been treated for the hemlock woolly adelgid, which has been killing hemlocks throughout their range. (For details on treatment, see the Maryland Department of Agriculture Hemlock Woolly Adelgid Management Plan, online.)
Highly threatened by the Hemlock Woolly Adelgid. A variety of moth species use Eastern Hemlock as a host plant including Comstock's Sallow Moth, Northern Pine Tussock Moth, Larch Tolype, Northern Variable Dart, Gray Spruce Looper Moth, Black Zigzag Moth, Pale-winged Gray Moth, White Triangle Tortrix Moth, and Angle-winged Emerald.
Deer browse the twigs. Red Squirrels and a few songbirds eat the seeds and Ruffed Grouse eat the buds and leaves (Brown and Brown, 1972).
There are 188 records in the project database.
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