Had someone ask me about Sassafras Albidium and seeing its one we are allowed to import as seed would anyone know a website that sells it, the only one I found was sold out.
I love sassafras, we have lots of it around here. I have never paid attention to when it makes seeds or what the flowers even look like. I suspect it drops them in spring though so not likely to find any this year. I'm reminded too that you wanted some persimmons, maybe I will finally be able to find some of them for you this fall.
That would be fantastic reed if you could still get some of the North American persimmon seed, I initiated a trade with a member on HGG for some, problem was I followed through with my seed to him, but he reneged on the deal and then ignored my PM's.
Richard,
Why does your friend want to grow it? I just googled it, and the Food and Drug Administration of the USA bans its use because it caused cancer in experiments with rats.
It smells wonderful and makes incredibly delicious tea. Not familiar with what the FDA has discovered or proved but the old folks in my family limited it's use to one or two cups per year. Just dig the roots in early spring, wash them off good and let them dry out for a few days. Drop in a cup of hot water for a few minutes, add sugar or honey to taste. To me it smells so good that almost don't have to actually ingest it. I remember as a kid keeping a piece in my pocket just to sniff it once in a while.
The one - two cups is probably best.
Sassafras contains Safrole - the amount consumed / duration taken increases the risks of developing cancer.
https://www.webmd.com/vitamins/ai/ingredientmono-674/sassafras
5mL of sassafras oil can kill an adult - granted most concentrated oils are rather dangerous.
There are safrole free sassafras extracts. Probably a pain to remove the safrole.
Making root beer as an experiment or a yearly tasting is probably fine.
This website has a recipe:
https://wildplantculture.com/home/2013/01/native-plant-root-beer.html
Some alternatives to Sassafras are listed here - also some other things that were traditionally added to root beer.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Root_beer
A tea could probably be made with those ingredients as well. Though, tea was one of the things that the mice tasted in the experiments. Liver damage / cancer in humans can take awhile to show up. I would only take these in very small dosages.
I found a random seedling near a yellow fruited Sambucus racemosa that I found a month or so ago. Suppose I will post it. Unsure of what seeds look like - when they drop. I usually just see them pop up every so often. Deer usually destroy them.
Sassafras fruits look like little black olives. They are borne at the end of long stems that turn bright red when the seeds are ripe.
We have a few of them around the area here (there were more, but the tree is considered weedy here so often cut down when it is in the way)
I think sassafras is a fine tree but mostly it is regarded as a weed here as well. It grows mostly as a understory tree along the edges of a woods. There isn't any that I know of in my immediate neighborhood but I do know where some groves of it are. I haven't had a cup of sassafras tea in I bet thirty years, next spring I might just have to go dig some up.
Jeremy, do you happen to know what time of year the fruits and seeds ripen?
I think midsummer. At least, I have memories of seeing them on the trees when we would go to the pool, and that would have been during summer.
I waited 20+ years to plant sassafras due to the safrole warnings myself. After a closer look, I felt safrole has a bad reputation as being a precursor chemical in illicit drug manufacturing.
Just off the top of my head I can think of a bunch of things that are being limited / discouraged to the general public...
Sudafed
Lye
Ammonium nitrate
Urea
Acephate
Powdered Coffee Creamer
& Sadly,
The Truth
Kind of disappointing reading the negative comments directed toward sassafras...
While the trees do produce berries, they are eagerly sought out by the various local songbirds...
(https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-6gEqR1vSE1E/U87azXTKPXI/AAAAAAAADYM/YWT0bAN_-YI/s1600/sassafras.jpg)
(https://4.bp.blogspot.com/-I4FdwIwF1lw/U87a1nwVpkI/AAAAAAAADYU/jfQtQFLT0sw/s1600/bird.jpg)
Gotta look close to see the bird...
Sassafras grows in very well drained soils... At my house in the sandhills, I have them aplenty...
I've transplanted them to the clay, with success, but it really isn't their niche.
Dunno about the safety of using the root tea, although, I have done so... I also use the leaves in my stew... Ever hear of file'?
Used in gumbo...
A desirable tree in my opinion.