sassafras

Photo: Randy Everette — CC BY-SA 3.0 · source

Survives zone 4 through 9

Harvest calendar

Best planted in early spring after your last frost, or in fall before the ground freezes, depending on your climate.

Grown for two different things and neither of them the berry: the young leaves, dried and ground, are filé powder, the thickener that finishes a Louisiana gumbo, and the tree gives some of the finest autumn colour in North America. ⚠ Root and root bark are NOT safe to consume — they contain safrole, and the traditional sassafras root tea is no longer considered advisable.

Hardiness

Zone 4–9

Habit

Tree

Edible part

Leaf

Ripens

Autumn

Mature size

Tree 9–18 m, occasionally to 25 m; often a suckering thicket of smaller stems

Light

Full sun to partial (light-demanding pioneer)

Soil pH

5.0–6.5 (acid)

Environment

Temperate

Native range

Eastern North America, from southern Maine and Ontario south to central Florida and west to Texas — a light-demanding pioneer of old fields, forest edges and clearings, often forming thickets from root suckers.

Status

Both wild and cultivated

Years to fruit

3–5 yrs

Growth speed

Fast — 60 cm a year in good conditions

Spacing

600 cm (236 in) apart — about 36 m² (388 sq ft) per plant

Leaf shape

Alternate and famously variable on one tree, often on one twig: some leaves plain oval, some two-lobed like a mitten, some three-lobed. 8–15 cm, aromatic when crushed, and brilliant orange, scarlet and gold in autumn — among the best autumn colour of any American tree.

Root system

A taproot when young, then wide, shallow, strongly suckering laterals that throw up a thicket around the parent — the reason sassafras colonises an abandoned field so quickly and is hard to keep as a single specimen. ⚠ The root and root bark contain safrole and are not safe to consume; the traditional sassafras root tea is no longer considered advisable.

Fruit description

Dark blue drupes about 1 cm on bright red club-shaped stalks, ripening in autumn on female trees — a striking combination, and heavily taken by birds. Not a food crop: the edible part of this tree is the young leaf, dried and ground into filé powder, the thickener of Louisiana gumbo.

Propagation

Root cuttings, or simply lifting a sucker with roots attached — much the easiest route, and sassafras transplants badly from anything larger. Seed needs cleaning and a long cold stratification. Dioecious, so both sexes are needed for fruit.

Pollination

DIOECIOUS — a male and a female tree are both needed for fruit. Not relevant if you are growing it for filé powder, which is made from the leaves.

The edible parts listed above are a starting point, not a field guide. Identify a plant with certainty — ideally against a local authority — before eating any part of it, and read the full disclaimer. Spotted something wrong? Report it.