Sorbus americana 2006 K.j.K.

The American Mountain Ash is in full bloom now, in mid-May, when little else has bloomed in the spring landscape.  Unlike its European cousin, the Showy Mountain Ash, the American Mountain Ash does not host fireblight, the deadly disease that attacks apple trees.  

A native to the upper midwest, the Sorbus americana is a beautiful, fast growing, strong, healthy shrub in the landscape.  Why wouldn’t it be happy when it is at home?

It is not overly aggressive and will stay where put.   In its native landscape it prefers a filtered light canopy.  A stray showed up in my driveway border and I left it, where it now precedes the lilacs in bloom.  At a distance it even resembles a lilac.  To survive in this border a plant must be drought tolerant, which surprisingly it is.

Rating: 5 star