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Days to maturity
Seasonal yields
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Plant · P-1159
Antelope Bitterbrush
Purshia tridentata
Antelope Bitterbrush is a slow-growing desert shrub that western wildlife depend on for winter forage - cattle, pronghorn, deer and elk all browse it, and it stays nutritious through the cold months when little else offers anything. It fixes a small amount of nitrogen through a root partnership with a soil bacterium, and it spreads only by seed that rodents bury and forget rather than by roots, so a stand expands slowly across a landscape. It needs a real winter and sharp drainage - its seed will not sprout without weeks of cold, moist chilling, and wet or fine-textured ground brings on root disease. Because deer and livestock find it so palatable, taking more than half its yearly growth or grazing new plants too soon can browse a stand out of existence.
Record at a glance
Growing profile
- Sun
- Full Sun
- USDA zone
- USDA 3–8
- Soil
- Sand · Loam
- Moisture
- Dry · Well-Drained
Vertical layer
Shrub- Soil pH
- 5.6–8.4
- Plant type
- Perennial
- Mature height
- 3.9–4.9 ft
- Mature spread
- 8 ft
- Plant spacing
- 8–16 ft
- Root type
- Tap
- Spread pattern
- Seed
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The deeper layer
Plan what comes next.
- Primary
- Locked ecological function
- Secondary
- Locked ecological function
- Byproduct
- Locked ecological function
Behind the record
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