2017 Plant of the Year, Honorable Mention

Proposed by: a member of Rochester Garden Club, Zone III

Michael Dirr states, “This plant has a lot to offer our landscapes in subtle beauty.” Carpinus caroliniana, also known as American hornbeam, ironwood or musclewood, due to its closely grained heavy, hard wood, is a small, deciduous hardwood, understory tree or multi-stemmed shrub native to eastern North America. Found in the wild along stream banks, moist woods, and in ravine bottoms, preferring moderate soil fertility and moisture, this species tolerates a wide range of temperatures, soils and moisture conditions, even several weeks of drought once established.  Slow growing in USDA Zones 3 to 9, American hornbeam can grow 20 feet high and 35 feet wide at maturity. 

Much admired for the bark, the smooth, grey trunk and branches exhibit a unique muscle-like fluting hence the other common name for the tree. In the spring, flowers bloom with male and female catkins.  The female catkins produce clusters of winged nutlets as they mature.  Long, oval, dark green, textured leaves turn shades of yellow, orange and red in the fall.

An attractively shaped globular tree, the catkins are a food source for numerous animals including squirrels, rabbits and beavers as well as turkeys, ducks, songbirds and grouse. The blossoms are a nectar source and the leaves a larval host for butterflies.

Resistant to disease, insects, ice damage and deer browsing, Hornbeam is suitable in a woodland setting, along a street, in a garden or as a bonsai specimen. 

Photograph courtesy of Julie Makin, Lady Bird Johnson Wildflower Center