Sassafras

''Sassafras'' is a genus of three extant and one extinct species of deciduous trees in the family Lauraceae, native to eastern North America and eastern Asia.Wolfe, Jack A. & Wehr, Wesley C. 1987. The sassafras is an ornamental tree. "Middle Eocene Dicotyledonous Plants from Republic, Northeastern Washington". ''United States Geological Survey Bulletin'' 1597:13 The genus is distinguished by its aromatic properties, which have made the tree useful to humans.

Description

Sassafras trees grow from tall with many slender sympodial branches and smooth, orange-brown bark or yellow bark. All parts of the plants are fragrant. The species are unusual in having three distinct leaf patterns on the same plant: unlobed oval, bilobed (mitten-shaped), and trilobed (three-pronged); the leaves are hardly ever five-lobed.Noble Plant Image Galler
Sassafras (includes photo of five-lobed leaf)
Three-lobed leaves are more common in '' Sassafras tzumu'' and '' S. randaiense'' than in their North American counterparts, although three-lobed leaves sometimes occur on '' S. albidum''. The young leaves and twigs are quite mucilaginous and produce a citrus-like scent when crushed. The tiny, yellow flowers are generally six-petaled; ''S. albidum'' and (the extinct) '' S. hesperia'' are dioecious, with male and female flowers on separate trees, while ''S. tzumu'' and ''S. randaiense'' have male and female flowers occurring on the same trees. The fruit is a drupe, blue-black when ripe.

File:Sassafras albidum, Sassafras pistillate flowers, Howard County, MD, Helen Lowe Metzman 2017-07-25-20.11 (38413696475).jpg, Pistillate (female) flowers
File:Sassafras albidum, Sassafras staminate flowers, Howard County, MD, Helen Lowe Metzman 2017-07-25-20.19 (24427586417).jpg, Staminate (male) flowers

The largest known sassafras tree in the world is in Owensboro, Kentucky, and is over high and in circumference.

Taxonomy

The genus ''Sassafras'' was first described by the Bohemian botanist Jan Presl in 1825. The name "sassafras", applied by the botanist Nicolas Monardes in 1569, comes from the French . Some sources claim it originates from the Latin or : "stone-breaking"; "rock" + "to break"). Sassafras trees are not within the family Saxifragaceae.

Early European colonists reported that the plant was called ''winauk'' by Native Americans in Delaware and Virginia and ''pauane'' by the Timucua. Native Americans distinguished between white sassafras and red sassafras, terms which referred to different parts of the same plant but with distinct colors and uses. Sassafras was known as fennel wood (German ) due to its distinctive aroma.

Species

The genus ''Sassafras'' includes four species, three extant and one extinct. Sassafras plants are endemic to North America and East Asia, with two species in each region that are distinguished by some important characteristics, including the frequency of three-lobed leaves (more frequent in East Asian species) and aspects of their sexual reproduction (North American species being dioecious).

Taiwanese sassafras, Taiwan, is treated by some botanists in a distinct genus as ''Yushunia randaiensis'' (Hayata) Kamikoti, though this is not supported by recent genetic evidence, which shows ''Sassafras'' to be monophyletic.Kamikoti, S. (1933). ''Ann. Rep. Taihoku Bot. Gard''. 3: 78

North America

*'' Sassafras albidum'' (Nuttall) Nees – sassafras, white sassafras, red sassafras, or silky sassafras, eastern North America, from southernmost Ontario, Canada through the eastern United States, south to central Florida, and west to southern Iowa and East Texas, formerly, Wisconsin
*†''Sassafras hesperia'' (Berry) – western North American, from the Eocene Klondike Mountain Formation of Washington and British Columbia; extinct, known only from fossils.

East Asia

*'' Sassafras tzumu'' (Hemsl.) Hemsl. – Chinese sassafras or ''tzumu'', central and southwestern China
*''Sassafras randaiense'' (Hayata) Rehd. – Taiwan

Distribution and habitat

Many Lauraceae are aromatic, evergreen trees or shrubs adapted to high rainfall and humidity, but the genus ''Sassafras'' is deciduous. Deciduous sassafras trees lose all of their leaves for part of the year, depending on variations in rainfall. In deciduous tropical Lauraceae, leaf loss coincides with the dry season in tropical, subtropical and arid regions.

Sassafras is commonly found in open woods, along fences, or in fields. It grows well in moist, well-drained, or sandy loam soils and tolerates a variety of soil types, attaining a maximum in southern and wetter areas of distribution.

''Sassafras albidum'' ranges from southern Maine and southern Ontario west to Iowa, and south to central Florida and eastern Texas, in North America. ''S. tzumu'' may be found in Anhui, Fujian, Guangdong, Guangxi, Guizhou, Hubei, Hunan, Jiangsu, Sichuan, Yunnan, and Zhejiang, China. ''S. randaiense'' is native to Taiwan.

Ecology

The leaves, bark, twigs, stems, and fruits are eaten by birds and mammals in small quantities. For most animals, sassafras is not consumed in large enough quantities to be important, although it is an important deer food in some areas. Carey and Gill rate its value to wildlife as fair, their lowest rating. Sassafras leaves and twigs are consumed by white-tailed deer and porcupines. Other sassafras leaf browsers include groundhogs, marsh rabbits, and American black bears. Rabbits eat sassafras bark in winter. American beavers will cut sassafras stems. Sassafras fruits are eaten by many species of birds, including bobwhite quail, eastern kingbirds,