Oemleria cerasiformis

Indian plum

Family: Rosaceae · Type: shrub · Native

Indian plum is a California native shrub found in northwestern California, western Cascade Range, western Sierra Nevada, Sutter Buttes, southern-central San Joaquin Valley, western Central Western, and southwestern Transverse Ranges in chaparral, canyons, streambanks, and woodland habitats at elevations up to 1,850 meters. Flowering from February to April, this plant produces fragrant white flowers in small pendulous racemes 3 to 10 centimeters long. Growing as a small shrub or tree 1 to 6 meters tall, it forms multiple stems with distinctive deciduous branching. Its simple leaves are elliptic to narrow-obovate, 5 to 13 centimeters long, with margins slightly rolled under and undersides paler than the upper surface. The plant bears blue-black, bean-shaped drupes 5 to 15 millimeters long that develop after flowering.

Habitat: Chaparral, canyons, streambanks, lowland wet to dry open woodland, coast to shaded conifer forest

Bloom period: Feb-Apr

Elevation: < 1850 m

Bioregions: NW, w CaR, w SN, ScV (Sutter Buttes), s-c SnJV, w CW, sw WTR

California counties: Sonoma, Amador, Lake, Mendocino, Fresno, Tulare, Del Norte, Humboldt, Santa Barbara, San Luis Obispo, Santa Clara, Monterey, Alameda, San Francisco, Contra Costa, San Mateo, Marin, Santa Cruz, Calaveras, El Dorado, Inyo, Mariposa, Napa, Glenn, Shasta, Siskiyou, Trinity, Colusa, Butte, San Benito, Tehama, Solano, Sutter, Placer, Nevada, Yolo

Data from The California Species Project — 14,000+ California species with verified data from CNPS, CDFW, USFWS, Jepson eFlora, Cal-IPC, and more.