Trees to 75m; trunk to 3.3m diam., massive, straight; crown narrowly conic, becoming rounded. Bark cinnamon- to gray-brown, deeply furrowed, plates long, scaly. Branches spreading, distal branches ascending; twigs gray-green to red-tan, aging gray, mostly puberulent. Buds cylindro-ovoid, red-brown, to 0.8cm, resinous. Leaves 5 per fascicle, spreading to ascending, persisting 2--4 years, 5--10cm ´ (0.9--)1--1.5(--2)mm, straight, slightly twisted, pliant, blue-green, abaxial surface with only a few lines evident, adaxial surfaces with evident white stomatal lines, margins finely serrulate, apex acuminate; sheath (1--)1.5--2cm, shed early. Pollen cones ellipsoid-cylindric, to 15mm, yellow. Seed cones maturing in 2 years, shedding seeds and falling soon thereafter, often clustered, pendent, symmetric, cylindric before opening, lance-cylindric to ellipsoid-cylindric when open, 25--50cm, yellow-brown, stalks 6--15cm; apophyses somewhat thickened; umbo terminal, depressed, resinous, slightly excurved. Seeds obovoid, oblique apically; body 1--2cm, deep brown; wing broad, 2--3cm. 2 n =24.

Montane dry to moist forests; 330--3200m; Calif., Nev., Oreg.; Mexico in n Baja California.