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Liquidambar styraciflua L.
Sweetgum
Florida native
A frequent tree of moist to wet hammocks, bluff and floodplain forests and other wooded areas through all but the southern tip of Florida. The range extends throughout the southeast and north into Illinois through Massachusetts, west into Texas, Oklahoma and Missouri, plus California.
Sweetgum trees can grow quite large, reaching 40m (~130 ft.) tall. The distinctive star-shaped leaves are alternate with long petioles and usually five, but occasionally seven, sharp-pointed lobes with finely-serrated margins. Male flowers are in racemes terminal on the branches. These staminate flowers lack both calyx and corolla and have many short stamens surrounded by hairy bracts. Female flowers are globular and on long slender peduncles from the leaf axils. The fruit is a hard spiny ball 25-40mm (1 to 1-1/2 in.) in diameter composed of 40-60 capsules. Many of these will contain sawdust-like undeveloped seeds. Fertile capsules contain one or two small winged seeds that are released when the capsule splits open at maturity. The fruit often remains on the otherwise bare tree over the winter. The dried fruit then falls to the ground where it persists in abundance.
Liquidambar styraciflua was previously placed in the Hamamelidaceae (witch-hazel) family. Now all of the genus Liquidambar is now considered to be in its own Sweetgum family Altingiaceae.
Liquidambar styraciflua is a member of the Altingiaceae - Sweetgum family.
Atlas of Florida Vascular Plants (Institute for Systemic Botany) profile for this species
iNaturalist profile for this species
USDA Plant Profile for this species
Date record last modified: Mar 10, 2024
