Silver linden

Appalachian-Blue Ridge forests

Arizona Mountains forests

Atlantic coastal pine barrens

Blue Mountains forests

Central Tallgrass prairie

Central-Southern Cascades Forests

Chilean Matorral

Colorado Rockies forests

Cross-Timbers savanna-woodland

A medium-to-large native shade tree of central and eastern North America, reaching 50 to 80 feet with an ovate-rounded crown and large, asymmetric heart-shaped leaves. In June it carries pale-yellow, intensely fragrant flowers on pendulous cymes - each cluster hung from a distinctive strap-like leafy bract - that ripen into pea-sized nutlets. The fragrant June bloom is a premier nectar source: Missouri Botanical Garden lists it as attracting bees and butterflies, and the Lady Bird Johnson Wildflower Center flags it as having special value to both native and honey bees.

What it needs

Conditions

Light

Full sun / Part shade

Water

Consistent moisture

Spacing

30 ft

Habit

Large deciduous shade tree with a dense, symmetrical pyramidal-to-oval crown

Care tips

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Lean on its strengths: of the lindens it is the best pick for hot, dry, or polluted urban sites, but still give it consistent moisture and room for a 30-50 foot spread while it establishes.

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Train to a single central leader when young and rub out basal suckers, which lindens produce freely.

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If you garden where bumblebees are scarce, be aware of the documented late-bloom bumblebee die-off beneath silver lindens - pair it with other summer nectar sources so foragers are not left dependent on a single depleting bloom.

Lifecycle

Planting

Plant in full sun to part shade in moist, fertile, well-drained loam; silver linden prefers consistent moisture but, once established, tolerates heat, drought, compacted soil, and urban pollution better than most other lindens. Give it room for a 30-50 foot spread.

Transplanting

Transplants readily balled-and-burlapped or from containers; move while dormant in late winter to early spring, set at the original depth, and water deeply through the first seasons to establish.

Early growth

Growth is moderate; keep young trees evenly watered and mulched (mulch off the trunk). Train to a single central leader and rub out any basal sprouts, which lindens produce freely.

Maturity

Mature trees reach about 50 to 70 feet tall and 30 to 50 feet wide with a long-lived, dense, symmetrical crown. Notably, the woolly leaf undersides and leaf orientation make silver linden far less prone to the heavy aphid populations and sticky honeydew drip that plague other lindens; Japanese beetle feeding may still occur but is cosmetic. It is one of the more durable, urban-tolerant shade trees in the genus.

Propagation

The species comes true from seed, but seed is slow and needs cold stratification (often two winters) to break dormancy; named cultivars are budded or grafted, and softwood cuttings can be rooted under mist. Basal suckers offer easy clonal material.

Similar plants

Browse lateral options with similar roles, light needs, size, or native-range overlap; these are not filtered for a better climate fit.

Tilia americana

American basswood

The only native U.S. holly with both spiny green leaves and bright red berries - an upright, pyramidal, broadleaf evergreen tree that slowly matures to 15 to 30 feet in cultivation (to 50 feet in the wild). Thick, leathery, deep green leaves bear spiny marginal teeth, and pollinated female trees carry showy red-to-orange drupes that ripen in fall and persist through winter as bird food. This is the classic "Christmas holly" of wreaths and decorations.

A tough, medium-sized native tree of the eastern and midwestern United States, grown as much for its showy edible orange fruit as for its distinctive thick, dark gray bark broken into rectangular blocks. Small urn-shaped white-to-greenish-yellow flowers open in May and June, and the sweet fruit ripens after frost. Largely dioecious - a female tree needs a male pollinizer nearby to set fruit - and notably drought- and walnut-tolerant once established.

A small native deciduous tree (or thicket-forming, suckering shrub) of eastern and central North America, grown for clouds of fragrant white 5-petaled flowers that open in March before the leaves and for the edible red plums that follow in early summer. It forms a broad, spreading crown with attractive dark reddish-brown twigs that sometimes carry thorny lateral branchlets. A documented larval host for swallowtails and other butterflies, with flowers of special value to native, bumble, and honey bees.

The largest native cherry of eastern North America - a medium-to-large deciduous shade tree that hangs elongated racemes of small white flowers in spring, then ripens drooping strings of pea-sized fruit from red to near-black in late summer. The fragrant white bloom feeds bees while the fruit is eaten by 33 species of birds and many mammals; it is also a workhorse larval host, supporting the Eastern Tiger Swallowtail and a string of giant silk and sphinx moths. Every part except the ripe fruit is cyanide-bearing and toxic.

Full sun / Part shade

A unique native shrub or small tree of eastern North American woodland margins, producing fragrant yellow strappy-petaled flowers in October through December when nothing else is blooming - the only North American native pollinated primarily by noctuid moths in cold weather. Yellow fall foliage doubles as background to the late-season bloom. Host for the witch hazel dagger moth (Acronicta hamamelis) larvae.