Red bay, aka swamp red bay

If you see a tree with lumpy galls on its leaves, it's probably a red bay.

Leaves of this tree are aromatic when crushed, with the wonderful fragrance of bay. The leaves are shiny green on top, dull and paler beneath. The leaf margins nearly always have unsightly but harmless greenish or black galls (lumps), which are good field marks for identification.

Our native red bay has been traditionally used in southern cooking as an excellent substitute for commercial bay leaves. Many cajun cooks actually prefer the native red bay to Laurus nobilis, the bay leaves of commerce. A leafy branch is collected and hung up in the kitchen to dry. When a few bay leaves are needed for a recipe, such as red beans, they are simply picked and dropped into the pot.

“Bay” is one of several old-fashioned terms for wetland. Other bay trees that grow in our area are sweetbay magnolia (Magnolia virginiana), loblolly bay (Gordonia lasianthus), an uncommon tree in the camellia family, and the bull bay (so named because cattle have been seen eating it), which is a folk name for Magnolia grandiflora, the southern magnolia.

Unfortunately for the red bay, there is a beetle, the ambrosia beetle, that lays its eggs in the red bay tree. The eggs have a fungus with them that kills the tree. Red bays are dying off all over the southeast. Maybe they will rebound or develop resistance. It’s too soon to tell. If you have red bay on your property, you can try cutting it off about two feet from the ground. The beetles apparently don't lay eggs on new growth, and if you keep your red bay bushy you may avoid it being killed.