Common Name: Gum, Sweet
Latin Name: Liquidambar styraciflua
Address: 1500 Oxford Road
GPS Coordinates: 38.0468511,-78.4836523000000
This Sweetgum tree is a neighborhood favorite, with many gum balls. The house was built in 1949. Other trees in the yard succumbed to recent storms but arborists say the Sweetgum is healthy.
With its distinctive star-shaped leaves, neatly rounded crown, unusual fruit, and twigs adorned with corky “wings,” the American Sweetgum is an attractive and distinctive shade tree. It has become a prized specimen in parks, on campuses, and in large yards across the country. Despite the maple-like shape of its leaves, the sweetgum is not a maple.
Native to the southeastern United States, the Sweetgum has a long and fascinating history. One of the earliest historical references to the tree comes from Spanish soldier and author Don Bernal Díaz del Castillo, who accompanied Hernán Cortés in 1519 and witnessed ceremonies involving Cortés and the Aztec ruler Montezuma. Both are said to have partaken of a liquid amber extracted from a sweetgum tree.
Sweetgum once had considerable commercial importance, with its resin used in products ranging from soaps and adhesives to pharmaceuticals. Today, its durable wood remains valuable for fine furniture, cabinetry, and interior finishing.
For some homeowners, however, the Sweetgum is best known for one less welcome feature: its fruit. Small, yellow-green flowers, often tinged with red, appear on stalks in spring. The female flowers develop into spherical, spiny fruiting heads commonly called “gumballs.” Each fruit is made up of numerous tiny capsules, with each capsule containing one or two winged seeds. As the fruit matures, it drops from the tree and can litter the ground from winter into early spring.
On the bright side, the sweetgum has plenty of ornamental appeal to balance its messy fruit. In autumn, its glossy, star-shaped leaves put on a spectacular display, turning brilliant shades of red, purple, orange, and yellow.