Natives For Your Neighborhood
Conservation of rare plants, animals, and ecosystems

General Landscape Uses: Buffer plantings. Spiny barriers.

Availability: Widely available in central Florida. Commonly available at native plant nurseries in South Florida. Available in Lake Worth at Indian Trails Native Nursery (561-641-9488), in Miami at Pro Native Consulting (786-488-3101), in Fort Meyers at Natives of Corkscrew, and in Boynton Beach at Sustainscape (561-245-5305).

Description: Small to medium tree or large shrub with a cylindrical crown from many small, irregularly-shaped branches. Trunks generally short, to about 10 inches in diameter. The branches bear many sharp, hooked spines. Bark gray, rough. Leaves compound, aromatic, about 3-4 inches long.

Dimensions: Typically 10-20 feet in height; to 26 feet in South Florida. As broad as tall or broader.

Growth Rate: Moderate.

Range: Monroe County Keys north to Volusia, Marion and Citrus counties; Bahamas, Greater Antilles, Texas, Mexico, Central America and South America. For a digitized image of Elbert Little's Florida range map, visit the Exploring Florida website.

 Map of select IRC data from peninsular Florida.

 Map of Postal Code Areas of IRC data from peninsular Florida.

Habitats: Hammocks.

Soils: Moist, well-drained sandy or limestone soils, with humusy top layer.

Nutritional Requirements: Moderate; can grow in nutrient poor soils, but needs some organic content to thrive.

Salt Water Tolerance: Low; does not tolerate long-term flooding by salt or brackish water.

Salt Wind Tolerance: Moderate; grows near salt water, but is protected from direct salt spray by other vegetation.

Drought Tolerance: High; does not require any supplemental water once established.

Light Requirements: Full sun.

Flower Color: Greenish-yellow.

Flower Characteristics: Inconspicuous. Fragrant. Dioecious, with male and female flowers on separate plants.

Flowering Season: All year; peak winter-summer.

Fruit: Orange-brown glandular punctate follicles opening to reveal small, shiny, black seeds.

Wildlife and Ecology: Provides significant food and moderate amounts of cover for wildlife. Larval host plant for giant swallowtail (Papilio cresphontes) butterflies. Perhaps a secondary larval host for Schaus' swallowtail (Papilio aristodemus) butterflies.

Horticultural Notes: Can be grown from seed removed from the outer coating. Scatter seeds over soil and barely cover. Germination is in about a month.

Comments: When crushed, the leaves have a lime-like aroma. The wood is much desired for making furniture. See also the Florida Wildflower Foundation's Flower Friday page.