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Seasonal yields
Sow indoors · Direct sow · Transplant outdoors
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Plant · P-1030
Littleleaf Sumac
Rhus microphylla
Littleleaf Sumac is a much-branched deciduous shrub of dry desert foothills and limestone hillsides in the southwestern United States and northern Mexico, growing four to fifteen feet tall with tiny leathery pinnate leaflets. Clusters of small white flowers open on bare branches ahead of the leaves in spring, followed by tart orange-red drupes about a quarter inch across that feed songbirds, gamebirds and small mammals into winter. It tolerates rocky, sandy or clay soil over limestone, drought, heat and alkaline ground, and it often forms colonies by suckering from the base.
Record at a glance
Growing profile
- Sun
- Full Sun · Partial Sun
- USDA zone
- USDA 8–11
- Soil
- Sand · Loam · Clay
- Moisture
- Dry · Well-Drained
Vertical layer
Shrub- Soil pH
- 6.1–8.5
- Plant type
- Deciduous Tree
- Mature height
- 4–15 ft
- Mature spread
- 8–12 ft
- Plant spacing
- Not yet recorded
- Root type
- Rhizome
- Spread pattern
- Root
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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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