Henk I have the same plant and it was thoroughly debated and rejected as a true nordmanniana specimen, at least by Clement among others. My specimen had cones that were the same. Maybe a hybrid? Veitchii??

-Will

Henk, those aren't Abies nordmanniana cones for sure.
The real cones for this species are a bluish-purple at first...

Here is a link that might be useful: Abies nordmanniana cones

Hey, Henk.
Looks like Abies fraseri cones to me!

-Sam

"Henk, those aren't Abies nordmanniana cones for sure.
The real cones for this species are a bluish-purple at first...

Here is a link that might be useful: Abies nordmanniana cones"

Abies nordmanniana cones are green, with at most a red-brown tinge. The bluish-purple cones at the top of the google images link are Abies koreana. Don't accept everything you see on google images!

Resin

Resin,
Thanks for this info
But do you think the cones at Henk's picture are Abies nordmanniana?

Hi Coniferjoy,

I'd like to wait to see them grow a bit, by next month they should be near full size and much easier to identify. But I suspect Sam could be right with Abies fraseri.

Here's some mature Abies nordmanniana cones:

Resin

And some immature Abies fraseri:

Resin

And immature Abies fraseri with purple cones:

Resin

Resin, how is it possible that the species Abies fraseri does have differend cone colours?
Are there several natural varieties?

"how is it possible that the species Abies fraseri does have differend cone colours? "

A simple presence / absence of particular anthocyanin pigments. Numerous conifers show variability like this in immature cone colour with green or red-purple immature cones.

There is a trend for higher altitude origins to have purple cones, and lower altitude origins to have green cones, but it is not absolute, there is a lot of overlap. The purple pigments appear to be involved in thermoregulation and/or UV tolerance.

Resin

Abies nordmanniana cones on our trees. 100% sure.