This 'Prairie Flame' Winged Sumac is a new cultivar from the partnership of Morton Arboretum and Chicagoland Grows, a northern Illinois nursery association. It is a compact selection that is supposed to grow about 5 to 7 feet high, but I saw the older labeled group along a drive and saw the shrubs were more like 8 or 9 feet high. It is also a male plant that does not bear fruit, though it bears the handsome creamy flower spikes in July-August. 'Morton' or 'Prairie Flame' is a selection from the natural variety of Rhus copallina latifolia that differs from the regular variety in that it has 5 to 13 leaflets that are a little broader and rounded at the base while the regular variety has 9 to 21 leaflets that are narrower and narrow at the base. It was selected from a plant from seed taken from Iroquois County in east central Illinois close to the Indiana border. This cultivar is offered at some larger, diverse nurseries.

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