# Bladdernut (Staphylea trifolia)

> Drooping white bell flowers in May and papery inflated seed pods that rattle in the fall wind.

Also called American bladdernut. Category: Native Shrubs. Grown from seed by Blue Whale Trees. Web version: https://bluewhaletrees.com/plants/bladdernut/

![Bladdernut (Staphylea trifolia) white bell-shaped flowers hanging among three-parted leaves](https://bluewhaletrees.com/img/plants/bladdernut-h1610-800.jpg)
*Photo: Jerzy Opioła, CC BY-SA 4.0, cropped · [Wikimedia Commons](https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Staphylea_trifolia_a1.jpg)*

## Facts

- Type: Shrub
- Mature height: 8 to 15 ft
- USDA hardiness zones: 4 to 8
- Grows wild in: Stream banks, rich moist slopes and the forest understory
- Native range: 32 states and [the District of Columbia](https://bluewhaletrees.com/tools/native/index.html.md?state=DC), north to [Minnesota](https://bluewhaletrees.com/tools/native/index.html.md?state=MN), south to [Florida](https://bluewhaletrees.com/tools/native/index.html.md?state=FL) and west to [Nebraska](https://bluewhaletrees.com/tools/native/index.html.md?state=NE) ([Alabama](https://bluewhaletrees.com/tools/native/index.html.md?state=AL), [Arkansas](https://bluewhaletrees.com/tools/native/index.html.md?state=AR), [Connecticut](https://bluewhaletrees.com/tools/native/index.html.md?state=CT), [Delaware](https://bluewhaletrees.com/tools/native/index.html.md?state=DE), [Florida](https://bluewhaletrees.com/tools/native/index.html.md?state=FL), [Georgia](https://bluewhaletrees.com/tools/native/index.html.md?state=GA), [Illinois](https://bluewhaletrees.com/tools/native/index.html.md?state=IL), [Indiana](https://bluewhaletrees.com/tools/native/index.html.md?state=IN), [Iowa](https://bluewhaletrees.com/tools/native/index.html.md?state=IA), [Kansas](https://bluewhaletrees.com/tools/native/index.html.md?state=KS), [Kentucky](https://bluewhaletrees.com/tools/native/index.html.md?state=KY), [Louisiana](https://bluewhaletrees.com/tools/native/index.html.md?state=LA), [Maryland](https://bluewhaletrees.com/tools/native/index.html.md?state=MD), [Massachusetts](https://bluewhaletrees.com/tools/native/index.html.md?state=MA), [Michigan](https://bluewhaletrees.com/tools/native/index.html.md?state=MI), [Minnesota](https://bluewhaletrees.com/tools/native/index.html.md?state=MN), [Mississippi](https://bluewhaletrees.com/tools/native/index.html.md?state=MS), [Missouri](https://bluewhaletrees.com/tools/native/index.html.md?state=MO), [Nebraska](https://bluewhaletrees.com/tools/native/index.html.md?state=NE), [New Hampshire](https://bluewhaletrees.com/tools/native/index.html.md?state=NH), [New Jersey](https://bluewhaletrees.com/tools/native/index.html.md?state=NJ), [New York](https://bluewhaletrees.com/tools/native/index.html.md?state=NY), [North Carolina](https://bluewhaletrees.com/tools/native/index.html.md?state=NC), [Ohio](https://bluewhaletrees.com/tools/native/index.html.md?state=OH), [Oklahoma](https://bluewhaletrees.com/tools/native/index.html.md?state=OK), [Pennsylvania](https://bluewhaletrees.com/tools/native/index.html.md?state=PA), [South Carolina](https://bluewhaletrees.com/tools/native/index.html.md?state=SC), [Tennessee](https://bluewhaletrees.com/tools/native/index.html.md?state=TN), [Vermont](https://bluewhaletrees.com/tools/native/index.html.md?state=VT), [Virginia](https://bluewhaletrees.com/tools/native/index.html.md?state=VA), [West Virginia](https://bluewhaletrees.com/tools/native/index.html.md?state=WV), [Wisconsin](https://bluewhaletrees.com/tools/native/index.html.md?state=WI) and [the District of Columbia](https://bluewhaletrees.com/tools/native/index.html.md?state=DC))
- Sun: Part, Shade
- Soil moisture: Average, Wet
- Growth rate: Fast
- Flowers: April to May
- Fruit: Pods, August to October
- First crop: 4 to 5 years (in quantity)
- Mature spread: 15 ft
- Traits: Showy flowers, Rare, Wildlife value, Tolerates shade, Tolerates wet soil, Winter interest
- Sold as: Saplings, Seed

Heights and zones are typical ranges for the species in cultivation; local conditions and seed source shift them.

## Availability

Saplings ship [bare-root](https://bluewhaletrees.com/articles/planting-bare-root-trees-on-arrival/index.html.md) or [in a pot](https://bluewhaletrees.com/articles/a-sapling-in-a-pot/index.html.md), [usually 12 to 18 inches tall](https://bluewhaletrees.com/articles/small-sapling-or-big-transplant/index.html.md), in the dormant season, and their [height and age](https://bluewhaletrees.com/articles/reading-a-nursery-listing/index.html.md) are stated with the price, once available. Live plants ship February to May and October to November. Not priced yet: leave an email on the web page for one email when it is priced, with a code for 10% off the plants in that order, not shipping or tax, or write to captain@bluewhaletrees.com.

## Notes

Bladdernut is an uncommon shrub of moist, shady stream banks and rich woods, striped green bark and all. It suckers into a loose thicket, tolerates heavy shade and flooding, and its curious inflated pods are a conversation piece. Underused because it is hard to find, not because it is hard to grow. Made for a collector's woodland garden, or for holding a damp bank under big trees.

## Size, growth and what to expect

Bladdernut is a fast-growing shrub. Our growth estimator models it at nearly three feet a year in youth, its figure for a fast grower. Stems reach 10 to 15 feet, and a colony spreads 10 to 20 feet wide as the suckers run.

The drooping clusters of greenish-white bells open in April and May, each flower about a third of an inch long, and bees and butterflies work them. By late summer the flowers have become papery inflated pods 1 to 2 inches long, green at first and light brown by fall, hanging on into early winter. The young bark is smooth and green with pale streaks.

It grows wild from New England and Ontario west to Minnesota and Kansas and south to Florida, in bottomland woods and thickets along streams.

## How to grow Bladdernut

Bladdernut belongs in part shade or full shade on average to wet ground: a stream bank, a low spot under big trees, the north side of a building. It takes brief flooding. The plant widens by suckers, so give it a 10 foot circle and room to drift.

Plant while dormant. Saplings come bare-root or potted. Open a wide, shallow hole, set the crown at grade, and use the soil you dug with nothing added. Keep mulch a few inches off the stems. Seed is slow and must not dry out. Sow it cleaned, outdoors in fall, in a bed screened against mice, and expect part of it to sit through a second winter. For a spring sowing, hold it damp at room temperature for three months and then in the refrigerator for three months.

Water through the first summer, especially where the site drains faster than a woodland floor. Rabbits and deer browse the soft shoots, so ring young plants with wire for two winters.

Bladdernut will not set seed with its own pollen, and a suckering patch is still one plant, so plant two or more seedlings from different parents. It spreads by root suckers into a loose colony, which is what you want on a bank and not in a small border. The inflated pods ripen tan and rattle all winter, and the striped bark shows best in winter. Cut damaged canes out after flowering.

## Sources

- [NC State Extension Gardener Plant Toolbox: Staphylea trifolia](https://plants.ces.ncsu.edu/plants/staphylea-trifolia/)
- [Missouri Botanical Garden Plant Finder: Staphylea trifolia](https://plantfinder.mobot.org/PlantFinderDetails.aspx?kempercode=i890)
- [Lady Bird Johnson Wildflower Center: Staphylea trifolia](https://www.wildflower.org/plants/result.php?id_plant=sttr)
- [USDA NRCS PLANTS Database: Staphylea trifolia, STTR](https://plants.sc.egov.usda.gov/plant-profile/STTR)
- [Garwood and Horvitz 1985, American Journal of Botany 72: 453-466, Factors limiting fruit and seed production of a temperate shrub, Staphylea trifolia](https://doi.org/10.1002/j.1537-2197.1985.tb05369.x)
- [The Morton Arboretum: American bladdernut](https://mortonarb.org/plant-and-protect/trees-and-plants/american-bladdernut/)
- [Missouri Department of Conservation field guide: American Bladdernut](https://mdc.mo.gov/discover-nature/field-guide/american-bladdernut)
- [Virginia Tech Dendrology: bladdernut, Staphylea trifolia](https://dendro.cnre.vt.edu/dendrology/syllabus/factsheet.cfm?ID=87)
- [Flora of North America, vol. 9: Staphylea trifolia](http://www.efloras.org/florataxon.aspx?flora_id=1&taxon_id=242417327)
- [Native Plant Trust, Go Botany: Staphylea trifolia](https://gobotany.nativeplanttrust.org/species/staphylea/trifolia/)
- [NatureServe Explorer: Staphylea trifolia](https://explorer.natureserve.org/Taxon/ELEMENT_GLOBAL.2.128869/Staphylea_trifolia)
- [University of Tennessee Extension, Tennessee Smart Yards: Staphylea trifolia](https://tnyards.utk.edu/staphylea-trifolia)
- [University of Arkansas Division of Agriculture, Plant of the Week: Bladdernut, Klingaman 2011](https://www.uaex.uada.edu/yard-garden/resource-library/plant-week/bladdernut-10-21-11.aspx)
- [Forest Research (Chinese Academy of Forestry) 2007, no. 5: Study on the Biological Characteristics of Staphylea bumalda DC. (Liu, Zhang and Liu 2007)](https://en.cnki.com.cn/Article_en/CJFDTOTAL-LYKX200705021.htm)
- [Anhui Agricultural Sciences 2013: Preliminary Study on the Biological Characteristics of Staphylea bumalda DC in Anqing (Yu 2013)](https://en.cnki.com.cn/Article_en/CJFDTOTAL-AHNY201304062.htm)

## Read before planting

- [Ten planting mistakes that quietly kill trees](https://bluewhaletrees.com/articles/ten-planting-mistakes/index.html.md)
- [Transplanting young trees: timing, water and protection](https://bluewhaletrees.com/articles/transplanting-young-trees/index.html.md)
- [Protecting young trees from voles, rabbits, deer and squirrels](https://bluewhaletrees.com/articles/protecting-trees-from-animals/index.html.md)
- [The habitat around a tree is part of the tree](https://bluewhaletrees.com/articles/habitat-around-a-tree/index.html.md)
- [What a young tree looks like: first-year seedlings of oak, walnut, hickory, chestnut, maple and redbud, and the weed trees to pull](https://bluewhaletrees.com/articles/what-a-young-tree-looks-like/index.html.md)
- [Invasive vines and shrubs are what is killing your woods](https://bluewhaletrees.com/articles/invasive-vines-and-shrubs/index.html.md)

## Related

- Plants that share its sun and soil: [Eastern Leatherwood](https://bluewhaletrees.com/plants/eastern-leatherwood/index.html.md), [Arrowwood Viburnum](https://bluewhaletrees.com/plants/arrowwood-viburnum/index.html.md), [Sweetshrub](https://bluewhaletrees.com/plants/sweetshrub/index.html.md) and [Mountain Doghobble](https://bluewhaletrees.com/plants/mountain-doghobble/index.html.md)
- Trees to plant it under: [Florida Maple](https://bluewhaletrees.com/plants/florida-maple/index.html.md), [Slippery Elm](https://bluewhaletrees.com/plants/slippery-elm/index.html.md) and [Ohio Buckeye](https://bluewhaletrees.com/plants/ohio-buckeye/index.html.md)
- Same size, similar character: [Toughleaf Dogwood](https://bluewhaletrees.com/plants/toughleaf-dogwood/index.html.md), [Long-stalked Holly](https://bluewhaletrees.com/plants/long-stalked-holly/index.html.md), [Bog Spicebush](https://bluewhaletrees.com/plants/bog-spicebush/index.html.md) and [Groundsel Bush](https://bluewhaletrees.com/plants/groundsel-bush/index.html.md)
- [Planting-site check](https://bluewhaletrees.com/tools/site-check/index.html.md): for a thrive, struggle or fail verdict on Bladdernut, add ?species=bladdernut with zone (2 to 10), sun (full, part, shade) and moisture (dry, average, wet) to that address; for example, the verdict for zone 4, part sun and average soil as Markdown is at https://bluewhaletrees.com/tools/site-check/index.html.md?species=bladdernut&zone=4&sun=part&moisture=average
- [Companion species for Bladdernut](https://bluewhaletrees.com/tools/companions/index.html.md?species=bladdernut): the natives that share its ground and the plants that pair with it in a yard.
- [Tree growth estimator](https://bluewhaletrees.com/tools/growth/index.html.md): how the height and trunk projections are made; the estimate for Bladdernut as Markdown is at https://bluewhaletrees.com/tools/growth/index.html.md?species=bladdernut (add height=, years= and site= poor, average or good)
- [Seed sowing planner](https://bluewhaletrees.com/tools/sowing/index.html.md): how Bladdernut is sown, in the chart for every species (treatment, cold days, depth, timing); the dated plan for it as Markdown is at https://bluewhaletrees.com/tools/sowing/index.html.md?species=bladdernut (add state= and zone= for your own frost dates, method=fridge for the refrigerator route)
- [Pollination planner](https://bluewhaletrees.com/tools/pollination/index.html.md): what Bladdernut needs for a crop and how many to plant, in the table for every species; the verdict for 2 of them as Markdown is at https://bluewhaletrees.com/tools/pollination/index.html.md?plants=bladdernut:2
- [Planting-window tool](https://bluewhaletrees.com/tools/planting-window/index.html.md): when to plant Bladdernut where you live, as a fall and a spring window from the local frost dates; the windows as Markdown are at https://bluewhaletrees.com/tools/planting-window/index.html.md?species=bladdernut&state=MO&zone=6 with your own state and zone in place of those
- [Planting-distance tool](https://bluewhaletrees.com/tools/distance/index.html.md): how far Bladdernut goes from a house, a septic field, a walk, wires, a property line and the next tree; the distances as Markdown are at https://bluewhaletrees.com/tools/distance/index.html.md?species=bladdernut&near=house,septic,pavement,wires,boundary,tree
- [Bloom and fruit calendar](https://bluewhaletrees.com/tools/calendar/index.html.md): the months Bladdernut flowers and fruits, in the grid for every species; its own row and the gaps of a planting with it as Markdown at https://bluewhaletrees.com/tools/calendar/index.html.md?plants=bladdernut