The mangle dulce is a long-lived desert adapted evergreen shrub (or small tree) growing 0.7 m – 4 m (6-12 feet) tall and 3 – 4 m (9-15 feet) wide (2, 3, 6, 11). Evergreen, woody, broadleaf perennial shrub, slow to initially establish in the landscape, but growth rate later increases with age and water availability, sprawling and mounding when mature, heights ranging from 4- to 10-feet tall with typically greater spread (5) It has light grey bark at maturity with young stems having a reddish brown color and puberulent (3, 11) It is unarmed, and highly branched (4). The medium green colored leaves are somewhat succulent, leathery, stiff, elliptic to obovate and 2-4cm (1-2 inches) long. (3, 5, 11). Leaf base is cuneate or rounded and margins are entire to remotely serrulate, the apex is obtuse to rounded and sometimes mucronate (11).  While leaves are nearly sessile, short petioles at the leaf bases have a reddish tint (5). The leaves, along with the dense branching give this shrub a medium-fine texture overall (5). Somewhat inconspicuous flowers are creamy white to yellow-green with a reddish calyx, 1.5 cm (3/4 of an inch wide appearing in spring summer and winter from April through November (3). Young fruits are green, oblong, capsules that ripen to a tan color, and open to reveal a seed covered in a bright, red fleshy aril that is 8-13 mm long by 4-6 mm wide (3, 5).

The densely branched habit of the plant supports wildlife by providing refuge to whitetail deer (ma'aso; Odocoileus virginianus subsp. sinaloense) (8).  Celastraceae species have a long tradition of use in folk medicine and agriculture and intensive research in modern times have resulted in the isolation of a large number of secondary metabolites with a wide range of bioactivity (9). In Mayo Ethnobotany (8), it reports the leaves of this plant are used medicinally - when mixed with petroleum jelly, and applied to sores that will not heal, healing is reported (8).  Others report chewing on leaves alleviates stomach problems (8). Leaves have been used as remedies for toothache and scurvy (4, 8). A 2014 study showed this plant contains lyoniresinol the which has been demonstrated as an antitrichomonal agent (which are antiprotozoal agents that act on trichomonas parasites) (10). The leaves of the plant are used as a forage for goats and the branches, which readily break off, make good firewood.  The gum is used as a substitute for gutta percha (a gum derived from Palaquium gutta tree in the Sapotaceae family) to bind splints for broken limbs, to fill golf balls and for use as an insulating material (4). In landscapes, mangle dulce is used as a border, foundation planting, hedge or screen when planted in mass and it is also useful for erosion control (7). In oasis or xeric landscapes, it serves as a good filler shrub that provides a brighter medium green to the more typical grey-green plants in southwest landscapes (5). It is very popular in native plant gardens in Florida and Texas but underutilized and less often grown in nurseries in the southwest. An Arizona nursery promotes the plant for use in large containers though, given its tolerance to many environmental conditions prevalent in Arizona, perhaps it deserves more attention in the landscapes throughout the southwest (2, 4).