About 15-20 years ago, I was visiting my sick Uncle during springtime in a hospital in Memphis. Outside in a garden area, there was this tree covered in lovely white pendulous blooms. I was instantly charmed. The soil beneath the tree had several small seedlings 2-3" tall growing in the mulch. I pulled up 2 of them and brought them home. Gave one to Mom and I planted the other. Mom's did not survive, mine did. But it has never bloomed. My husband thought this tree was a honey locust, we know it is some kind of a locust. My question is, why will it not bloom? I see them all along the road every year, I'm seeing them right now. But mine will not bloom. Is this one of those male & female things??? Wouldn't you know I'd get the non bloomer?

It sounds like black locust, Robinia pseudoacacia. It doesn't have male and female flowers on separate plants so I don't know why it isn't blooming. Maybe someone else has some ideas, but the only thing I can think of is whether it is getting enough sun?

Oh yes, it's in full sun. It's by itself. A single tree. I have been so disappointed. I love those lovely white blooms. Thanks for trying to help.

Anyone else have any info or suggestions as to why my tree does not bloom??

How tall is the tree now? I'm wondering if the seedlings you thought were the (black) locust were something else? We have quite a few locusts and their seedlings don't usually show up underneath- they show up yards away from the original tree, and grow quickly.

A photo of the tree, closeup of bark, and leaves if they are out, would be very helpful with ID.

It is 25-30 ft tall now. It is for sure a locust tree. I figured it made seed and these came up from the previous years seeds dropped from the tree, they were not suckers off the trees roots, but true seedlings. That I do remember.

It's foliage is very delicate, I will get a pix tomorrow hopefully. We are in the middle of a terrible thunderstorm right now with heavy rains. If it clears in time, I'll get one today. Thank you Alyssa for your help.

Ok. Sounds good. The other notable things related to black locust is: branches have very sharp thorns and cannot easily be picked up without gloves, and the trees drop more branches compared to other trees, during storms.

I'd think it must be something to do with the location, Donna. Some trees are stimulated to bloom by day length or temperature, and others bloom when the weather gets dry after a rainy spring. My lychee tree has not bloomed at all this spring (no fruit, sadly) because we had an unusually wet winter this year - record rainfall for January. It's done this before, so I know it needs a dry period to stimulate its bloom cycle.

Is your locust tree by any chance in the middle of a lawn that gets regular watering? Can you possibly turn off the sprinklers that water the tree and give it a week or two of "drought" to see if this gets it to put out some buds? (the lawn in the shade of the tree probably won't suffer too badly . . . )

Elaine, I never water the tree, it is not close enough to my flower beds that it would get water from them either, so idk there?? And there are lots of locust trees near here in bloom, so location and light situations is really not a factor. I just kept wondering if there were male & female trees in this species, and I had the one that did NOT bloom. All it dies is have little clusters of green things on it that look like they might be young clusters of immature buds. The first year it did that, I got excited, cause they are elongated like the white blossom cluster, and I thought it was setting buds. But they never did anything. And every year they form and never do anything.

Alyssa, I don't think my tree has any thorns on it. I have never seen any on it, nor on any of the occasional branch that it might drop. It does have some strange green stuff growing in it though. Mossy looking stuff. I don't know what it is, have not noticed it before, but taking the pix today, I saw it all in the limbs like Spanish moss. And we are way too far north fir Spanish moss. I took a pix of a fluff of it on the side of the trunk. I also took pix of the leaves, trunk, the tree and the little bloom cluster things.

donnabking said: All it dies is have little clusters of green things on it that look like they might be young clusters of immature buds. The first year it did that, I got excited, cause they are elongated like the white blossom cluster, and I thought it was setting buds. But they never did anything. And every year they form and never do anything.

Alyssa, I don't think my tree has any thorns.....

It sounds like maybe you have a honey locust (Gleditsia) whereas the locust with the pendulous white blooms is the black locust (Robinia).

Maybe some insect or bird is eating the buds before they can open?

When it forms the green clusters, maybe pick one and see if there's any bug activity on there? A hose-end sprayer and a spray of mild soapy water solution might take care of it if that's the problem.

Here are pix. The leaves, then the trunk of the tree so you can see the bark. You can also see that green fluffy stuff that is growing on the tree, I have no idea what that is, but it is not the reason it does not bloom, as this is the first time I have noticed it on the tree. Then you can see the little blossom buds that never bloom, or whatever they are.

Not the best picture, but this is the flower on honey locust:

http://www.hort.uconn.edu/plan...

These are black locust flowers:

https://www.google.ca/search?q...

Edited to add, we cross posted - your flower does look like the honey locust flower and the leaves don't look like black locust, so unfortunately you have the wrong locust.

This is a pix of the tree itself, but the lighting was not great by the time the storm had passed. But you can see, it is way taller than my house. Also, another shot of the bloom like clusters.

From my understanding, there are only two types. The first is black locust, which I am very familiar, and the bark definitely does not look like black locust. The other is honey locust. Both have thorns though, and they are obvious.

Edit: we posted at the same time. The tree is a locust shape.... I'm wondering about the thorns though.

I see no thorns. But that bloom thing on my tree looks exactly the honey locust bloom Sue posted. Exactly! But why would that tree be growing under a locust tree that had white blooms , a black locust??

Yes, I clicked on the link and it does look a lot like what Sue posted. Do you ever get bean pods dropped in the yard?

I do not remember any. Perhaps it does not make any because there is no pollinator tree nearby??

Well, thank you all so much. I now know what I really wanted was a black locust, and I have a blasted honey locust, drat it all!!!! Thank you all for all the help mystery solved.

Disappointing but at least now you know. Although some honey locusts can have thorns, the cultivated ones are often thornless, BTW.