Photo: Andrew Ciscel, CC BY-SA 2.0 · Wikimedia Commons

American Plum

Prunus americana

Also called wild plum, common plum.

A thicket-forming wild plum for dry banks and wet ground alike, with fragrant white spring bloom and tart red-yellow fruit for jelly and wildlife.

Showy flowersEdibleWildlife valueDrought tolerantErosion controlBears young

Type: Small tree
Mature height: 15–25 ft
USDA zones: 3–8
Growth rate: Fast
Sun: Full, Part
Soil moisture: Dry, Average, Wet
Grows wild in: Stream banks, old fields and edges
Native range: 41 states and the District of Columbia, north to North Dakota, south to Florida and west to Washington
List all 42
Alabama, Arizona, Arkansas, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, Florida, Georgia, Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Kansas, Kentucky, Louisiana, Maryland, Massachusetts, Michigan, Minnesota, Mississippi, Missouri, Montana, Nebraska, New Jersey, New Mexico, New York, North Carolina, North Dakota, Ohio, Oklahoma, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, South Carolina, South Dakota, Tennessee, Utah, Vermont, Virginia, Washington, West Virginia, Wisconsin, Wyoming and the District of Columbia
Also recorded in 2 other states, outside its native range. See what is native in your state

Hardiness zones Find your zone by ZIP code

American plum is the hardiest native plum, growing from the Canadian prairies to Georgia. Its suckering habit makes a fast, thorny hedgerow that shelters songbirds; the fruit ripens in August and makes superb jam. Its roots hold the soil, and its thorny thickets slow wind erosion in a drought. A shelterbelt tree for the prairie, a dry-bank thicket where lawn grass gives up, or a hedge along a wet ditch.

Size, growth and what to expect

American plum is a fast grower by most accounts. It grows fast, and our growth estimator models it at nearly three feet a year in its youth on an average site. It runs from a thicket shrub to a small tree of 15 to 25 feet, tallest and most often single-stemmed in the South. Root sprouts come up as much as 10 feet from the parent and build the thorny thickets.

Fragrant white flowers an inch across open in April and May before the leaves. The red to yellow plums, three quarters of an inch to an inch and a quarter long with a single stone, ripen in August. A good crop comes about every other year. Wild turkeys, grouse, foxes, raccoons, deer and black bears eat them, and the thickets shelter songbirds. On the western Great Plains it is the wild plum of the shelterbelts, planted for drought resistance.

It grows wild from southern Saskatchewan and Quebec south to central Florida and west to Montana and Oklahoma, on prairie edges and along riverbanks.

How to grow American Plum

American plum grows in full sun or part shade. It takes a stream bank or a low spot that stays wet in spring as readily as a dry bank. Because it suckers into a thicket, plant it where a spreading, thorny hedge is welcome: a fence line or windbreak, and keep it 15 feet from paths and buildings. Set trees 15 to 25 feet apart.

Plant dormant bare-root saplings from late fall through early spring. Dig a hole twice as wide as the roots and no deeper, set the root flare at grade, and backfill with plain soil. Mulch a ring three inches deep, kept off the trunk. Sow plum pits in fall, two inches deep, under hardware cloth against mice and squirrels. For a spring sowing, hold them damp in the refrigerator for three to five months first.

Give it a deep soak once a week through the first summer. Rabbits and voles love plum bark, and deer browse the shoots, so guard the trunk for three years. Prune in late winter to remove dead wood and crossing stems, and mow off unwanted suckers.

Wild plum needs a second seedling nearby for good fruit set, and the crop ripens in August. Watch for black knot, a lumpy black fungus on twigs; prune it out well below the swelling. Seedlings bear within three to five years.

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

Sources (12)