6-12' × 8-12'
Soft-yellow flowers early in spring followed by small clusters of glossy red berries (drupes) by mid to late summer. Blue-green foliage turns golden yellow in fall. Edible berries and medicinal twigs and bark. Scratch the berries, foliage or stems and you’ll know how it got its name: all three have a delicious lemony spicy scent and can be used as a native alternative to allspice. Leaves, twigs and fruit used in teas.
Attracts bees, birds and butterflies, particularly the strange and dynamic Spicebush Swallowtail (Papilio troilus) larva with its stunning false eye spots.
Large rounded multi-stemmed native shrub suited to naturalizing in moist or wet areas, singly or in groups. Prefers moist well-drained neutral or slightly acidic soils. Often found in full or partial shade, but at its showiest in full sun. Dioecious, requiring separate male and female plants for the female to produce fruit. These are unsexed seedlings—plant two or more to ensure berries. Native to eastern U.S. Zone 5.