Creek Plum

Size, growth and what to expect

No source rates its growth, so our growth estimator uses the fast rate of our Chickasaw plum, nearly three feet a year. On the limestone of central Texas it makes a thorny thicket of 3 to 8 feet. In its wild goose plum form it grows into a small tree of up to about 25 feet.

White flowers about half an inch across open in clusters of two to four in March and April, before or as the leaves unfold. They are fragrant, and bees and butterflies visit them. The plums ripen from July into September, half an inch to an inch across, red or yellow, often blushed crimson, with small white dots. Birds and mammals eat them, and the thicket gives them cover.

It grows wild from central Texas north to Kansas and Colorado, and east through Arkansas, Louisiana and Missouri to Illinois, Ohio, Kentucky, Tennessee, Alabama and Georgia. Its home is stream banks, creeksides, roadside thickets, prairie hillsides, limestone woodlands and the borders of woods.

How to grow Creek Plum

Creek plum grows in full sun or part shade, and in full sun it makes a denser, fuller thicket. It takes limestone clay or sand, moist or dry, and it suits alkaline ground. Pull stray root suckers, or give the thicket room to spread. Set trees 15 feet apart, and keep each one 15 feet from a wall. Keep it at least 15 feet from overhead wires.

Saplings ship bare-root or potted. Plant them dormant, from leaf fall until bud swell, in a hole wider than the roots and no deeper. Set the root flare at the soil line, put the native soil back in, and keep the mulch clear of the stems. Clean the pits and sow them outdoors in early fall, an inch deep, under hardware cloth against mice. For spring, hold them damp in the refrigerator for 80 to 100 days first.

Water weekly through the first summer, then only in a long drought. Deer browse the twigs of wild plums, so guard each young plant with wire for its first two or three years. Prune in late winter, only to remove dead, broken or crossing branches.

Plums need pollen from a second plum to set fruit, and a thicket from one root counts as one tree, so plant two or more from different seed. Seedlings can bear from about their third year. Texas creek plums are tart, and Native Americans ate them only now and then. Webworms can strike it, as they do many plants of the rose family. As in all plums and cherries, the seed inside the fruit is poisonous and should never be eaten.