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Prairie Crabapple

Malus ioensis

Prairie crabapple is the wild crabapple of the tallgrass Midwest, opening showy fragrant pink blossoms a little later than its eastern cousin. Tart green fruit makes good jelly and feeds wildlife through fall. As with every apple, the flesh is the food and the seeds are cyanogenic — worth knowing when milling fruit for jelly, though the flesh itself carries none.

Family

Rosaceae

Type

tree

Lifespan

perennial

Height

25–25 ft

Spacing

15–25 ft apart

Light

sun

Soil moisture

moist

Soil pH

acidic, neutral

Bloom

May, June

Bloom colors

white, pink

Wildlife value

songbirds, larval host

Caterpillar hosts

~308 butterfly & moth species

Landscape uses

naturalizing

Native states

AR, IA, IL, IN, KS, KY, LA, MI, MN, MO, MS, NE, NJ, OH, OK, SD, TX, WI, WV