Black Gum

The earliest, deepest red fall color of any native tree, plus blue-black berries for migratory birds and honey bees that love the flowers. black gum earns every square foot it takes.

Black gum turns red before anything else in the fall landscape, sometimes in late August, and the color is a deep, saturated scarlet that stops people in the driveway. Plant it where the afternoon sun backlights it. The show runs for weeks. This is one of the finest fall-color trees in eastern North America, and it does it reliably year after year regardless of weather conditions. Small blue-black berries ripen alongside the fall foliage and are eaten by migrating thrushes, waxwings, and woodpeckers. The flowers are small and inconspicuous but extremely nectar-rich: beekeepers prize black gum honey as among the finest produced in the East. Deep taproot means the tree anchors well in heavy storms and tolerates wet soils and occasional flooding once established.