White MulberryWHITE

At various points two distinct families were called white mulberries in the United States; both were introduced in connection with initiatives to set up silk worm industries.  From the late 17th century a settled conviction that American colonials would be able to compete with the Chinese and Italian silk industries, provided they had mulberries and worms became the enduring pipe dream of agricultural projectors.  Whether in South Carolina in the 1660s, Georgia in the 1730s, or South Carolina in the 1810s, a contingent insisted that winter months could be filled with caccoon management and silk spinning.  Periodically people attempted to make the ambition a reality.  Early in this process would-be silk growers determined that silk worms had ittle use for the vegetation of Virginia or South Carolina.  The worms' traditional food--white mulberries would have to be imported.  And they were, in quantity.  The Morus alba version was particularly robust and quickly spread across the landscape as bird bird droppings founded semi-wild orchards.  It proved so fertile that it became an invasive species.  Furthermore it crossed easily with Native red mulberry, leading to the dilution of the genetics of the Native strain.  

The Morus multicaulis was a Chinese tree, introduced by way of Europe, multi stemmed, relatively hardy, and bearing leaves that were the favorite food of silk worms.  Because the ambition to create a silk industry to compete with China and Italy many plants were brought to the United States. Morus Alba was the single stemmed white mulberry, a variety that had many strains, each of which sometime or other collected its own unneeded Linnean name and each of which bore a fanciful eastern place of origin (see the Morus constanopolitanea illustrated here; a purported Turkish variety). White mulberries of various sort flood the United States in the 1830s, prompting  a mulberry bubble.  Fortunes were made dealing white plants in anticipation of home silk manufacturies.  Silk proved harder to produce that promised.  White mulberries proved easier to propagate by seed than nurserymen warned.  By 1845 the countryside was awash in white mulberry of both sorts, and they began to be extirpated as pests.  

White mulberry ranges between 30 and 45 feet in height. The alternate leaves variously shaped, ranging from two to eight inches in size, enlongated, shiny, with a heart shape form and blunt serrations at the edge.  The mature tree has fissured gray bark. Plants are normally dioecious (male and female flowers on separate plants). Male flowers are small, green and occur in 1-2 inch long catkins. Female flowers are inconspicuous and crowded in short spikes. White mulberry is similar to the Morus rubra, but may be distinguished by the leaves. White mulberry leaves are glossy while red mulberry are not. 

The multicaulis would eventually vanish from the landscape (the current variety called Pakistan may be a form of it).  Meanwhile birds have spread Morus alba across the country (with the exception of Nevada).  The fruit of the white mulberry was not much favored by human consumers. 

David S. Shields