Flora of North America species comparison

The green links below add additional plants to the comparison table. Blue links lead to other Web sites.
enable glossary links

Morus alba

Moraceae

moral blanco, mulberry, mûrier blanc, Russian mulberry, silkworm mulberry, white mulberry

mulberry family
Habit Shrubs or trees, to 15 m. Bark brown tinged with red or yellow, thin, shallowly furrowed, with long, narrow ridges. Trees, shrubs, herbs, or vines, deciduous or evergreen, frequently with milky sap.
Branchlets

orange-brown or dark green with reddish cast, pubescent or occasionally glabrous;

lenticels reddish brown, elliptic, prominent.

Buds

ovoid, 4-6 mm, apex acute to rounded;

outer scales yellow-brown with dark margins, glabrous or with a few marginal trichomes;

leaf scars half round, bundle scars numerous, in circle.

Leaves

blade ovate, often deeply and irregularly lobed, (6-)8-10 × 3-6 cm, base cuneate, truncate, or cordate, margins coarsely serrate to crenate, apex acute to short-acuminate;

surfaces abaxially glabrous or sparingly pubescent along major veins or in tufts in axils of principal lateral veins and midribs, adaxially glabrous to sparsely pubescent.

blade: margins entire, toothed, or lobed;

venation pinnate or with 3-5 basal palmate veins;

cystoliths often present in epidermal cells.
Inflorescences

racemes, cymes, or capitula.
Flowers

staminate and pistillate on same or different plants.

unisexual, staminate and pistillate on same or different plants, small, occasionally on flattened torus, more often enclosed within fleshy, flask-shaped receptacle (syconium);

sepals 2-6, distinct or partly connate (vestigial in Brosimum).
Staminate flowers

sepals distinct, green with red tip, ca. 1.5 mm, pubescent;

filaments ca. 2.7 mm.

stamens equal in number to sepals or calyx lobes and opposite them, straight or inflexed;

anthers 1-2-locular.
Pistillate flowers

ovary green, ovoid, slightly compressed, ca. 2 mm, glabrous;

style branches divergent, red-brown, 0.5-1 mm;

stigma papillose.

sepals or calyx lobes 4, ± connate;

pistils 1, 1-2-carpellate;

ovary 1, superior or inferior, 1(-2)-locular;

ovules 1 per locule;

styles or style branches 1-2;

stigmas 1-2, entire.
Fruits

multiple (syncarps);

individual achenes or drupelets partly or completely enclosed by enlarged common receptacle or by individual calyces.
Catkins

peduncle and axis pubescent; staminate catkins 2.5-4 cm; pistillate catkins 5-8 mm.

Syncarps

red when immature, becoming black, purple, or nearly white, cylindric, 1.5-2.5 × 1 cm;

achenes light brown, ovoid, 2-3 mm.

Morus alba

Moraceae
Phenology Flowering spring–summer.
Habitat Disturbed areas, woodland margins, fencerows, dry to moist thickets
Elevation 0-1500 m (0-4900 ft)
Distribution
from FNA
AL; AR; CO; CT; DC; DE; FL; GA; IA; IL; IN; KS; KY; LA; MA; MD; ME; MI; MN; MO; MS; NC; NE; NH; NJ; NY; OH; OK; PA; RI; SC; SD; TN; TX; VA; VT; WI; WV; ON; Europe; native to e Asia [Introduced in North America]
[WildflowerSearch map]
[BONAP county map]
Widespread in tropical and subtropical regions; less common in temperate areas
[BONAP county map]
Discussion

Morus alba is sometimes planted and possibly naturalized in Arizona, California, and New Mexico. It is reported from Washington as a local escape.

Mulberry leaves provide the natural food for silkworms. Commercially cultivated mulberries are varieties of Morus alba; they are prized as shade trees with edible fruits.

Morus alba and M. rubra are both highly variable and are often confused. Both species have deeply lobed to entire leaves and are variable in pubescence. Some individuals are intermediate in leaf pubescence, suggesting the possibility of hybridization.

Native Americans used infusions made from the bark of Morus alba medicinally in various ways: as a laxative, as a treatment for dysentary, and as a purgative (D. E. Moerman 1986.

(Discussion copyrighted by Flora of North America; reprinted with permission.)

Genera ca. 40, species nearly 1100 (7 genera, 18 species in the flora).

Members of the large and diverse mulberry family are mainly woody and tropical; they are most abundant in Asia. The largest genera are Ficus, with approximately 750 species, and Dorstenia, with about 170 species. The family includes important timber trees, e.g., Chlorophora excelsa (Welwitsch) Bentham, iroko, from tropical Africa; Brosimum guianense (Aublet) Huber, letterwood, snakewood; and Ficus spp. Genera with species bearing edible fruits include the mulberries, Morus spp.; breadfruit and jackfruit, e.g., Artocarpus altilis (Parkinson) Fosberg and A. heterophyllus Lamarck; and figs, Ficus spp. Several species of Ficus are commonly cultivated in subtropical regions of the United States. These include F. carica Linnaeus; F. elastica Roxburgh ex Hornemann, India rubber plant; F. benghalensis Linnaeus, banyan; F. benjamina Linnaeus, weeping fig; F. pumila Linnaeus, creeping fig; and F. microcarpa Linnaeus f., Indian-laurel.

Rubber plants and weeping figs are commonly sold as houseplants. Economically, the most important species are those associated with the silk trade. Morus alba Linnaeus, M. indica Linnaeus, M. laevigata Wallis, and M. serrata Roxburgh, cultivated in many temperate and tropical countries, provide the natural food source for the silkworm, Bombyx mori Linnaeus.

Cudrania tricuspidata (Carrière) Bureau ex Lavallée, used as a food source for silkworms when Morus spp. are in short supply, is cultivated in North America as a hedge plant. The fruit is edible. Native to Korea and China, C. tricuspidata is known from a collection made in 1956 in McIntosh County, Georgia (S. B. Jones Jr. and N. C. Coile 1988), and it is naturalized in Orange County, North Carolina (R. D. Whetstone, pers. comm.).

(Discussion copyrighted by Flora of North America; reprinted with permission.)
Key
1. Herbs.
→ 2
1. Trees, shrubs, or vines.
→ 3
2. Plants lacking evident aerial stems, rhizomatous, perennial; inflorescences axillary, long-pedunculate.
Dorstenia
2. Plants caulescent, taprooted, annual; inflorescences axillary, short-pedunculate.
Fatoua
3. Flowers all borne on inside of syconium; terminal vegetative bud surrounded by pair of stipules.
Ficus
3. Flowers not borne on inside of syconium or only a solitary female flower immersed in receptacle; terminal vegetative bud scaly, not surrounded by pair of stipules.
→ 4
4. Margins of leaf blade toothed, often lobed; venation appearing palmate, or weakly 3-veined from base.
→ 5
4. Margins of leaf blade entire, never lobed; venation pinnate.
→ 6
5. Pistillate inflorescences globose; styles unbranched.
Broussonetia
5. Pistillate inflorescences cylindric; styles 2-branched.
Morus
6. Leaf blade ovate to lanceolate, not leathery; trees deciduous; syncarps 8-12 cm diam.
Maclura
6. Leaf blade oblong, leathery; trees evergreen; syncarps 1.5 cm diam.
Brosimum
Source FNA vol. 3. FNA vol. 3, p. 388. Author: Richard P. Wunderlin.
Parent taxa Moraceae > Morus
Sibling taxa
M. microphylla, M. rubra
Subordinate taxa
Brosimum, Broussonetia, Dorstenia, Fatoua, Ficus, Maclura, Morus
Synonyms M. alba var. tatarica, M. tatarica
Name authority Linnaeus: Sp. Pl. 2: 986. (1753) Link
Web links 
Unless otherwise noted, all data comes from the online version of the Flora of North America, who have made most of their content available via a Creative Commons license (CC BY 4.0).



Type/paste one or more Latin names into the boxes above; matching taxa will show up below the box as you type. You can use the up/down arrow keys to move through the list.

(If the plant you're looking for doesn't show up in the auto-complete list, that means it either isn't described in Flora of North America yet, or it's listed under a synonym. And please note that Flora of North America is still missing several plant families, including Fabaceae, Apiaceae, Boraginaceae, and Polemoniaceae.)

Choose a data source: Flora of North America, OregonFlora, UW Burke Herbarium

The species comparison tool is brought to you by:
Northwest Wildflowers