Christmas tree week: red cedar

Red cedar is another of the conifers that is quite easy to identify because it does not have needles. I was surprised to find that it is a fairly common Christmas tree because I have never seen it for sale and it seems to me to be wrong for a Christmas tree. It is too prickly.

There are a quite a few small red cedar trees around Rensselaer. Here are a couple that are on Melville Street.
Here is a bigger one on Angelica and Webster. Its shape is a bit distorted by ice. It is the largest one I have found in Rensselaer.
Two are growing next to the Carnegie Center.
This closeup of the red cedar probably does not help much with identification, but I think it is rather pretty. I took the picture on Vine Street. Can you guess when I took it?This is a more useful illustration of its leaves.
The red cedar is not closely related to the white cedar. It is a juniper. Unlike the other conifers, it does not have cones, but its seeds are in small blue berries.