Devil's club

Photo: Gordon Leggett — CC BY-SA 4.0 · source

Survives zone 4 through 9

Harvest calendar

Ripens: Shoots harvested for only a few days in early spring

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

Only the very youngest spring shoots are edible, peeled and cooked — the window closes within days as the plant's dense spines harden. The bright red late-season berries are conspicuous but not edible to people, though bears eat them freely.

Hardiness

Zone 4–9

Habit

Shrub

Edible part

Shoot

Ripens

Shoots harvested for only a few days in early spring

Mature size

1–3 m, sprawling in loose clumps

Light

Full shade to part shade

Soil pH

5.0–6.5 (acidic)

Environment

Cool temperate rainforest understory, streambanks

Native range

Pacific Northwest of North America, from Alaska south through British Columbia to Oregon, inland to Idaho and Montana — wet to moist forest understory, streambanks and boggy ground from lowland to subalpine elevations.

Status

Wild

Years to fruit

3–5 yrs (shoots, not fruit)

Growth speed

Slow

Spacing

200 cm (79 in) apart — about 4 m² (43 sq ft) per plant

Leaf shape

Large, maple-like, on densely spiny stems

Root system

Spreads by layering — sprawling stems root where they touch moist ground, forming clumps.

Fruit description

⚠ Not food. The flattened scarlet berries in a dense spike are conspicuous and are eaten by bears and thrushes, but they are not considered edible for people. The edible part is the very young peeled spring shoot, and only in the few days before the spines harden.

Propagation

Stem cuttings from horizontal branches in late spring to early summer, layering, or seed (slow, sometimes taking up to 18 months to germinate).

Pollination

Insect-pollinated, chiefly by flies and small bees in cool wet forest. The plant spreads mainly by layering, so pollination has little to do with how a colony grows.

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.