Sassafras

Sassafras is a small tree with much to offer. In the spring, it attracts Spicebush Swallowtail and Eastern Tiger Swallowtail butterflies to its yellow flowers. The blue fruit in fall is a food source for robins, bluebirds, and mockingbirds. Its lobe-shaped leaves are sure to catch the eyes of kids.

Nanticoke tribes of Delaware and Maryland found sassafras roots, bark, branches and leaves to be a one-stop shopping source of food, building material and medicine for a cold, fever, diarrhea, measles, a wound or a bee sting. Today, ground-up young sassafras leaves and stems are an ingredient of gumbo. (The FDA has declared other extracts from other parts of the tree to be carcinogens and banned their use.)

For more information, see the USDA Plant Guide

This tree ID sign is sponsored by the Baltimore County Forestry Board,
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