Is a northern catalpa a good tree to plant in Indiana?
Northern Catalpa can work here, with caveats. Native to a narrow band along the lower Ohio and Wabash country and planted far beyond it, so central Indiana has plenty in fencerows, alleys, and old farmsteads where it was grown for rot-resistant posts. Almost none are being planted today, which means the standing population here is aging into its failure window all at roughly the same time.
What you'd be signing up to clean up
The heaviest-debris tree on this list, in three distinct waves — white flowers carpeting the drive in June, oversized leaves that blacken and drop early after the first hard frost, and 8-to-20-inch bean pods falling all winter that a mower will not mulch. Some years catalpa sphinx caterpillars add a fourth wave: mass defoliation plus frass raining onto whatever is below, which homeowners routinely mistake for a fatal problem.
Where to keep it away from
Catalpa roots are coarse and reasonably deep, and it simply is not a hardscape-conflict tree — you rarely find it lifting a drive or in a sewer lateral. What it does have is broad tolerance for central Indiana's worst conditions: alkaline clay, road salt, and both wet and dry sites, which is why so many survive untended in ditch banks, alleys, and old farm lots.
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