// SPECIES PROFILE · MEDIUM TO LARGE TREE · NATIVE · BUTTERFLY HOST

Sugarberry

Celtis laevigata

Sugarberry is the southern hackberry of the American bottomlands — a medium to large tree of moist, rich floodplain soils from Virginia to Texas that follows the Arkansas River drainage into far eastern Oklahoma. Often confused with its northern cousin (Celtis occidentalis), sugarberry has narrower, less toothed leaves and sweeter, orange-red drupes that give the tree its name. It is a quiet workhorse in the native canopy: fast-growing on wet clay, tolerant of seasonal flooding, and an irreplaceable larval host for four major butterfly species including the hackberry emperor and the mourning cloak.

// QUICK FACTS

Family: Cannabaceae (hemp/hackberry family)
Group: Medium to large deciduous tree, 40–80 ft
Native range: VA & southern IN west to MO, E OK, south to FL & TX
USDA hardiness: Zones 5–10 (Tulsa = 7a/7b)
Mature size: 40–80 ft tall × 30–60 ft crown spread
Sun: Full sun; tolerates light shade when young
Soil: Moist clay, loam, silt; tolerates compaction & seasonal flooding; pH 5.5–7.5
Water: Moist to wet-mesic; drought-tolerant once established
Growth rate: Fast (2–3 ft/yr on good bottomland soil)
Lifespan: 100–150 years typical
Fruit: Orange-red drupes, sweet, edible — ripe September–October
Butterfly host: Hackberry emperor, tawny emperor, question mark, mourning cloak & more
Ecological role: Bottomland canopy · butterfly host · cavity-nesting tree

Sugarberry (Celtis laevigata) — smooth gray bark with distinctive corky warts and narrow serrated leaves — *Celtis laevigata* — mature tree showing characteristic smooth gray bark with corky warts and alternate narrow leaves. Photo via Wikipedia / Wikimedia Commons.

Identification

[ field key — bark · leaf · fruit · confusables ]

Habit, twigs & bark

Sugarberry typically forms a broad rounded crown on a single trunk with a moderately clear bole in bottomland stands, or a lower-branching, wider crown in open sites. The bark is the most useful field mark: smooth and pale gray, sometimes nearly silver, with distinctive scattered corky warts and ridges that appear as small raised bumps and irregular horizontal bands. Young twigs are slender, zigzag and greenish-brown, often with fine hairs, turning gray with age. Winter identification: the combination of smooth gray bark with corky warts, zigzag twigs, and persistent small drupes (if present) is unmistakable in NE Oklahoma bottomlands.

Leaves

Alternate, simple, narrowly ovate to lanceolate, 2–4 in long and 1–2 in wide, with an asymmetrical base (one side of the leaf blade attaches slightly lower on the petiole than the other — a character shared with all hackberries) and a long tapering tip. Margins are serrated but the teeth are fewer, smaller, and sparser than on common hackberry; in far-southern stands the leaves may be essentially entire. The upper surface is medium green and smooth to the touch; the lower surface is paler and typically glabrous except for tufts of hair in the vein axils. Fall color is a modest soft yellow that develops late and is not reliable; sugarberry is not grown for autumn display.

Flowers & fruit

Flowers are small, greenish, and inconspicuous, appearing with the leaves in April–May. Sugarberry is polygamo-monoecious (most flowers are perfect and self-fertile, with occasional unisexual flowers on the same tree) — unlike many dioecious natives, a single tree produces fruit reliably. The fruit is a round drupe 1/4–3/8 in across, dull orange-red to purple-brown at maturity, ripening in September–October and often persisting on the tree into early winter. Each drupe contains a single hard, bony pit. The thin flesh is sweet and edible with a date-like flavor — children in the rural South have long known these as "sugarberries" and eat them straight from the tree.

Confusables

Common hackberry (Celtis occidentalis) is the most frequent source of confusion. It has broader, more coarsely serrated leaves, darker bark that develops corky ridges into a distinctive "warty" pattern on mature trunks, and drupes that are darker red-purple and less sweet. Common hackberry is also more cold-hardy (zone 2) and prefers upland sites, while sugarberry is a bottomland specialist. In NE Oklahoma, the two species overlap in range but separate ecologically: if you are standing in the Arkansas River floodplain on wet clay, you are almost certainly looking at C. laevigata. On a dry upland ridge, it is likely C. occidentalis. Netleaf hackberry (C. reticulata) is a smaller, shrubby tree of dry limestone sites in western Oklahoma; its leaves have prominent net-like veins and it rarely reaches the Tulsa area.

Habitat & Range in NE Oklahoma

Celtis laevigata is a tree of the southern and southeastern US that follows the major river systems into the western edge of its range in central and eastern Oklahoma. In NE Oklahoma, sugarberry is native to the Arkansas River bottomlands in far eastern Tulsa County and more abundantly eastward into Wagoner, Muskogee, Sequoyah, and Le Flore counties, where it grows with eastern cottonwood, sycamore, black willow, and green ash on the natural levees, first terraces, and floodplain flats of the Arkansas, Verdigris, Grand, and Illinois rivers.

It is a floodplain specialist: sugarberry tolerates periodic inundation, heavy wet clay, and anaerobic soil conditions that kill many other hardwoods. It is one of the first trees to colonize freshly deposited alluvium after riverbank slumping. In the lower Arkansas valley, sugarberry is common in the understory of cottonwood-sycamore forests, where it can persist in moderate shade while young and then break into the canopy as cottonwoods age out. On drier upland sites in the Tulsa area, sugarberry occurs less frequently and is generally smaller; the tree needs consistent subsoil moisture to reach full stature.

In suburban Tulsa, sugarberry shows up most often as a volunteer in low-lying backyards, drainage ditches, and older neighborhoods built on what was once Arkansas River bottomland. The fast growth and tolerance of compacted soil make it an unsung hero of urban canopy reforestation in wet-clay sites where other trees fail.

Ecology & Wildlife Value

[ butterfly host · fruit · cavity nesting · bottomland keystone ]

Larval host for emperors & anglewings

Sugarberry is in the genus Celtis, and every Celtis species is a primary larval host for a suite of charismatic butterflies. In NE Oklahoma, hackberry emperor (Asterocampa celtis), tawny emperor (A. clyton), question mark (Polygonia interrogationis), and mourning cloak (Nymphalis antiopa) all deposit eggs on sugarberry leaves. Hackberry emperor caterpillars feed gregariously in the early instars, and while a heavy feeding may partially defoliate a branch tip, the tree easily outgrows the damage. The adult butterflies are part of the summer-bottomland fauna that makes an Arkansas River canoe float in June so rich: hackberry emperors puddling on wet sand bars, tawny emperors circling the canopy, mourning cloaks sunning on fallen logs.

Fruit & bird use

The small sweet drupes are eaten by over 25 species of birds, including cedar waxwings, American robins, northern mockingbirds, eastern bluebirds, brown thrashers, northern flickers, red-bellied woodpeckers, and northern cardinals. The fruit ripens in early fall and is typically cleaned off by midwinter — earlier than possumhaw holly, filling a different phenological niche in the wildlife food calendar. Mammals including raccoons, opossums, gray foxes, and squirrels also eat the fruit, and white-tailed deer browse the foliage and twigs. The thin-sweet-fruit, early-fall-ripening strategy makes sugarberry complementary to rather than redundant with persimmon, possumhaw, and dogwood in a bottomland wildlife planting.

Cavity & dead-wood value

Sugarberry is a moderately soft-wooded tree that develops heart rot and limb cavities in old age more readily than the dense oaks and hickories around it. This is an ecological asset: sugarberry snags and cavity-riddled live trees provide nest sites for wood ducks, screech-owls, great crested flycatchers, red-headed woodpeckers, and prothonotary warblers in bottomland forests. The dead branches, softened by decay fungi, are worked by pileated woodpeckers excavating for carpenter ants. A bottomland without sugarberry is a bottomland with fewer cavities.

Insect community & pests

Hackberry nipple gall (caused by the psyllid Pachypsylla celtidismamma) produces small raised bumps on the leaf undersides and is the most commonly noticed insect association. The galls are entirely cosmetic and do not reduce tree vigor. Hackberry psyllids also produce copious honeydew that can drip on cars and patios beneath the canopy — a consideration in driveway plantings. Sugarberry is generally free of serious diseases in Oklahoma; occasional powdery mildew in late summer in dense, shaded canopy interiors, and leaf spots in unusually wet seasons. No pest or disease threatens established trees.

Sugarberry is a fast, tough street tree for wet clay. Where Tulsa's heavy clay soils defeat pin oaks and maples, sugarberry thrives. It tolerates compaction, flooding, drought, and neglect with equal indifference. If you have a wet, low corner of a property and need a shade tree in ten years rather than forty, sugarberry is one of the best native options available in the regional trade.

Horticulture & Care

[ siting · planting · pruning · maintenance ]

When to plant

Container-grown sugarberry establishes well from October through March. Fall planting is ideal because winter rains settle the root ball before the first growing season. Because sugarberry is fast-growing and fibrous-rooted (no taproot), it transplants easily and tolerates bare-root planting well.

Planting & establishment

Sun: full sun (6+ hours). Tolerates part shade when young but will lean toward light.
Soil: thrives in wet clay, compacted clay, silty loam, sandy loam, and alluvium. One of the most soil-tolerant native trees in eastern Oklahoma.
pH: flexible; acid to moderately alkaline.
Hole: twice the container width, same depth; slightly proud in heavy clay.
Spacing: 25–40 ft from structures and other large trees; the canopy is broad at maturity.
Water: deep weekly soaking through the first two summers. After establishment, sugarberry is moderately drought-tolerant on deep moist soil but will drop leaves early in prolonged drought on thin soil.
Mulch: 2–3 in hardwood mulch, keeping the root flare exposed.

Pruning & shaping

Prune in late winter (February–March) before bud break.
Sugarberry tends toward multiple codominant stems; select a central leader when the tree is young and remove competing leaders.
Limb up gradually over the first 10–15 years to raise the canopy over walkways and structures.
Remove broken branches after ice storms — sugarberry wood is somewhat brittle and can sustain damage in heavy ice loads.
Deadwood prune on mature trees every 5–7 years for safety in residential settings.

Pests & diseases

Hackberry nipple gall (psyllid) — cosmetic only; no treatment needed or recommended.
Hackberry psyllid — may produce nuisance honeydew in late summer; avoid planting directly over patios or parked cars.
Powdery mildew — occasional in dense canopy; thin interior branches for airflow.
Witches' broom (caused by Sphaerotheca phytoptophila, a powdery mildew-fungus-erineum mite complex) — dense clusters of distorted twigs are common and harmless; some landscapers find the brooms unsightly but they are a characteristic feature of the genus and should be tolerated.
No serious diseases threaten sugarberry in Oklahoma. It is one of the low-maintenance natives.

Propagation

Sugarberry is grown from seed. Collect ripe fruit in September–October, macerate to remove the pulpy flesh, and cold-stratify the cleaned pits for 60–90 days at 34–41°F. Sow in spring in deep tree-band containers. Germination is reliable. The species is occasionally available as container-grown nursery stock at native plant nurseries in Oklahoma and Arkansas; it is less common in big-box garden centers, which favor common hackberry or non-native shade trees.

Cultural & Material Uses

Sugarberry has never been a high-value timber species, and its cultural footprint is quieter than the oaks and hickories around it — but the tree's fruit, wood, and ecological role have earned it a steady, if understated, place in the southern landscape.

Edible fruit: the thin sweet flesh of sugarberry drupes is edible raw and was eaten by Indigenous peoples across the tree's range, including the Quapaw and Caddo in the Arkansas drainage. The fruit is rarely collected at scale because the pit is large relative to the amount of flesh, but for a child walking a bottomland trail in October, a handful of sugarberries is a remembered sweetness.
Wood: pale yellow to light brown, close-grained, moderately soft, and not durable in ground contact. It has been used occasionally for furniture, interior trim, and inexpensive millwork where appearance rather than strength is the primary requirement. Not a commercial timber species but useful on the farm for fencing (above ground) and rough crating.
Wildlife landscaping: OSU Extension, the Oklahoma Department of Wildlife Conservation, and NRCS all include sugarberry on recommended native tree lists for eastern Oklahoma wildlife habitat. It is particularly valued for bottomland reforestation plantings and riparian buffer strips along agricultural waterways.
Urban forestry: sugarberry's tolerance of compacted wet clay, flooding, and neglect makes it a candidate for urban canopy restoration in Tulsa's low-lying neighborhoods where infrastructure and soil conditions are challenging. The City of Tulsa urban forestry program has used sugarberry in floodplain reforestation projects along Mingo Creek and Joe Creek.
Cherokee and regional ethnobotany: the Cherokee traditionally used hackberry bark in a decoction for sore throat and as a general tonic. Documentation for sugarberry specifically is sparser, but its range overlaps strongly with Cherokee and Muscogee (Creek) traditional territories, and it was almost certainly used interchangeably with common hackberry.

Sources & Further Reading

USDA NRCS PLANTS Database — Celtis laevigata: plants.usda.gov/plant-profile/CELA
Lady Bird Johnson Wildflower Center — Celtis laevigata: wildflower.org — CELA
USDA Forest Service Silvics of North America — Celtis spp., hardwood volume.
Dirr, M.A. (2009), Manual of Woody Landscape Plants, 6th ed., Stipes Publishing.
Oklahoma State University Extension — HLA and NREM publications on native tree selection for eastern Oklahoma riparian zones.
Oklahoma Forestry Services — Forest Trees of Oklahoma, field guide, current edition.
Scott, J.A. (1986), The Butterflies of North America: A Natural History and Field Guide, Stanford University Press — for Celtis-butterfly associations.
Tallamy, D.W. (2007), Bringing Nature Home, Timber Press — for Celtis as butterfly host genus.
Wikipedia — Celtis laevigata: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Celtis_laevigata (CC BY-SA 4.0).

Companion Planting

[ guild · polyculture · cross-layer pairings ]

In a bottomland forest or riparian planting, sugarberry pairs naturally with: eastern cottonwood (Populus deltoides), American sycamore (Platanus occidentalis), black willow (Salix nigra), eastern redcedar (Juniperus virginiana), green ash (Fraxinus pennsylvanica), and possumhaw holly (Ilex decidua).

Site sugarberry as a mid-to-upper canopy component in bottomland guilds, beneath the taller cottonwood-sycamore overstory or as a stand-alone shade tree in wet corners of the landscape.