Inland serviceberry

Photo: Alex Hauner — CC BY-SA 4.0 · source

Survives zone 4 through 8

Harvest calendar

Best planted in early spring after your last frost, or in fall before the ground freezes, depending on your climate.

Once treated as a variety of Saskatoon (A. alnifolia); a hairy ovary (bald in most look-alikes) is the surest field mark. Sweet and juicy even before fully ripe, one of the better-flavoured serviceberries.

Hardiness

Zone 4–8

Habit

Shrub

Edible part

Fruit

Ripens

June–July

Mature size

Large shrub to small tree, 6–9 m (20–30 ft); usually multi-stemmed, occasionally single-trunked

Light

Full sun to part shade

Soil pH

5.0–7.5 (acid to mildly alkaline) — unusually soil-tolerant, takes sandy, loamy or clay ground

Environment

Temperate

Native range

North-central and eastern North America — Nova Scotia and Maine west to Minnesota and South Dakota, south to Ohio and Illinois; hillsides, stream banks and dry-to-moist woodland edges.

Status

Wild

Years to fruit

2–4 yrs

Growth speed

Moderate

Spacing

250 cm (98 in) apart — about 6.3 m² (67 sq ft) per plant

Leaf shape

Egg-shaped to elliptic, widest at or below the middle, 4–6 cm long, finely toothed (22–45 teeth per side); bronze-tinted when young, hairless at maturity

Root system

Spreading, suckering — forms clonal thickets rather than a single deep root

Fruit description

Berry-like pome, 6–17 mm across, ripening deep reddish-purple; sweet and juicy even before fully ripe

Propagation

Seed (harvested green and sown fresh, or given 4+ weeks warm stratification), spring layering (about 18 months to root), or division of two-year-plus root suckers in late winter

Pollination

Insect-pollinated (bees) and self-fertile, like the genus; a second plant improves set.

The edible parts listed above are a starting point, not a field guide. Identify a plant with certainty — ideally against a local authority — before eating any part of it, and read the full disclaimer. Spotted something wrong? Report it.