Foliage: Deciduous

Mature Height: 20’ - 30’

Mature Width: 20’ - 30’

Growth Rate: Moderate

Hardiness: 10 degrees F

Exposure: Full Sun

Leaf Color: Green to Pale Blue-Green

Shade: Filtered

Flower Color:  Yellow

Flower Shape: Funnel Shaped Petals

Flower Season: Spring

Thorns: None

Propagation Method: Seed

Sizes Available: 24”, 36”, 48", 54"

For year-round beauty and sheer volume of spring color, few desert-adapted trees can rival the Blue Palo Verde, Cercidium floridum. Blue-green bark, smooth on younger branches but becoming more grayish and fissured as trees mature, gives color to the graceful trunks and highly divided branches while providing a dark green backdrop for the intense yellow spring flower display. Flowers first appear in early spring and may persist into early summer. In mature, vigorous specimens, flowers literally cover the leaf canopy, creating masses of yellow in the landscape or dotting desert hillsides. When properly pruned, the trees reveal the color, texture and sculptural qualities of their trunks. The canopy is made up of finely divided branches armed with small thorns, and compound leaves with 5 to 10 tiny leaflets.

Blue Palo Verde is native to the American southwest and northern Mexico (including Baja California) and is widely distributed across this range from sea level to four thousand feet. This species is highly adapted to desert conditions, tolerating high summer temperatures, and is cold hardy to 10 to 15 degrees. It is found naturally along desert washes and on hillsides where soils are reasonably developed and where some summer soil moisture is available. In native settings Blue Palo Verdes grow as large shrubs, 25' to 35' tall and as wide.

Its uses include: as single large specimens or small groupings as a landscape focal point; at project entries; near monuments or signs; or at tee boxes, greens and along fairways in golf courses. Its desert form and character make it ideal as a transition tree between landscaped areas and undisturbed desert or as a theme tree in large landscape designs. They are also use in streetscape and perimeter planting in commercial, residential and municipal landscapes.