Physiognomy and Structure: These forests are of low to medium stature (10-25 m) and are dominated by needle-leaved evergreen trees. Cold-deciduous trees are often mixed in these stands, especially in recently disturbed areas. These communities often have sclerophyllous or cold-deciduous shrub layers of moderate cover (10-30%). The herbaceous layer is usually well-developed, and dominated by mesophytic forbs and graminoids less than 1 m in height.

Floristics: These forests are characterized by the dominance of Picea pungens in the forest canopy and usually represent a mesic phase of the mixed conifer forests of the southern Rocky Mountains and Colorado Plateau. Early-seral stands may be codominated by Populus tremuloides. Other conifers are usually present in these stands, depending upon geographic location, site moisture, and stand history. Common associates include Abies concolor, Abies lasiocarpa, Picea engelmannii, Pinus contorta, Pinus ponderosa, Pinus strobiformis, and Pseudotsuga menziesii. The shrub layer is usually of only moderate cover and dominated by ericaceous or cold-deciduous species, with the latter group increasing with soil moisture or proximity to watercourses. Common species include Acer glabrum, Amelanchier alnifolia, Arctostaphylos uva-ursi, Cornus sericea, Juniperus communis, Mahonia repens, Quercus gambelii, Ribes inerme, Rosa woodsii, Rubus parviflorus, and Symphoricarpos rotundifolius. Due to favorable soil moisture, the herbaceous layer is usually a diverse mixture of forbs and graminoids and may include and Achillea millefolium, Arnica cordifolia, Carex siccata (= Carex foenea), Erigeron eximius, Festuca arizonica, Fragaria virginiana, Linnaea borealis, Packera cardamine (= Senecio cardamine), and Pseudoroegneria spicata.

Dynamics:  Picea pungens is a slow-growing, long-lived tree which regenerates from seed (Burns and Honkala 1990a). Seedlings are shallow-rooted and require perennially moist soils for establishment and optimal growth. Picea pungens is intermediate in shade tolerance, being somewhat more tolerant than Pinus ponderosa or Pseudotsuga menziesii, and less tolerant than Abies lasiocarpa or Picea engelmannii. It forms late-seral stands in the subhumid regions of the southern Rocky Mountains. It is common for these forests to be heavily disturbed by grazing or fire. Stems of Populus tremuloides are thin-barked and readily killed by fire. It is a fire-adapted species that generally needs fire or some other stand-replacing disturbance to establish and maintain dominance in a forest. These mixed forests are seral and in the absence of stand-replacing disturbance such as fire will slowly convert to a Picea pungens-dominated climax forest (Mueggler 1988). Most of the stands sampled by Mueggler (1988) had a history of livestock grazing as evidenced by relative abundance of the exotic plants Taraxacum officinale and Poa pratensis and the scarcity of grazing-susceptible plants (Mueggler 1988).