Kansas Wildflowers and Grasses

WHITE SASSAFRAS

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Sassafras albidum (Nutt. ) Nees

Schermerhorn Park, Cherokee County, Kansas

Height: Shrubs to trees, to 26+ feet

Family: Lauraceae - Laurel Family

Flowering Period: March, April

Trunks:

Erect; bark gray to reddish brown, furrows deep, ridges long, flat-topped; wood brownish orange, soft.

Twigs:

Pale green with olive mottling, flexible, glabrous or pubescent; leaf scars crescent-shaped to more or less half-round; buds olive-green, ovoid, .04 to .3 inch, apex obtuse to acute, scales glabrous or pubescent.

Leaves:

Deciduous, alternate, simple; petiole .4 to 1.2 inch, pubescent; blade elliptic-ovate to obovate, 1,2 to 6 inches long, .3 to 3.6 inches wide, base tapered to cuneate, margins entire to 2-3-lobed, apex obtuse to acute, lower surface light green to yellowish green, glaucous, pubescent, especially along veins, upper surface green to dark green, sparsely pubescent, especially along midvein.

Flowers:

Axillary from wood of previous year, racemes or racemose panicles, 4-10-flowered; floral bract 1; peduncle .4 to .8 inch; pedicels .2 to .3 inch, becoming red in fruit, club-shaped, fleshy.Unisexual, radially symmetric, fragrant; tepals 6, greenish yellow, connate basally, narrowly elliptic, .12 to .18 inch; staminate: stamens 9; pistillate: staminodes 6; pistil 1; style 1, .08 to .12 inch; stigma 1.

Fruit:

September-October; drupes, bluish black, ovoid to obovoid, .28 to .43 inch long, .2 to .28 inch wide, glabrous, fleshy; stone 1, dark brown, ovoid to ellipsoid, granulate, 2-ridged.

Habitat:

Woodlands, edges of forests, old fields, pastures, fencerows, roadsides, often in rocky soil.

Distribution:

Southeast corner of Kansas

Origin:

Native

Uses:

Sassafras albidum was an important medicinal, food, and fiber source for a number of Native American tribes in eastern North America. The dried and powdered leaves are used to make filé powder, a seasoning and thickening agent in Louisiana Creole cuisine.

Comments:

Sassafras albidum is dioecious and aromatic.

White sassafras leaves