Photo: Unknown — Public domain · source
Survives zone 2 through 8
Harvest calendar
Best planted in early spring after your last frost, or in fall before the ground freezes, depending on your climate.
Fruit ripens to a bluish-black, sweet, raisin-like pulp over a single flattened stone — good eaten fresh off the shrub once fully ripe, though the thick skin and large seed limit it mostly to jam, sauce, or leather.
- Hardiness
- Zone 2–8
- Habit
- Shrub
- Edible part
- Fruit
- Ripens
- Aug–Sept
- Mature size
- Shrub 2–4 m; containerable when young
- Light
- Full sun to partial (one of the more shade-tolerant)
- Soil pH
- 5.5–7.0
- Environment
- Temperate
- Native range
- Eastern and central North America, from the Canadian Maritimes and Quebec west to Manitoba and Saskatchewan, south to Georgia, Missouri, and Wyoming.
- Status
- Both wild and cultivated
- Years to fruit
- 2–3 yrs
- Growth speed
- Medium
- Spacing
- 150 cm (59 in) apart — about 2.3 m² (24 sq ft) per plant
- Leaf shape
- Opposite, oval, 5–10 cm long, wedge-shaped to rounded at the base, with a pointed tip and finely serrated margins; leaf stalks are often slightly winged.
- Root system
- Spreading, suckering root system that sends up new shoots at some distance from the main stems; old arching branches can also root where they touch the ground.
- Fruit description
- Oval drupes to about 15 mm, blue-black with a waxy bloom in flat-topped clusters on red stalks; pulpy, very sweet, and juicy but with a thick skin and one large flattened seed.
- Propagation
- By seed (which typically shows double dormancy and needs warm followed by cold stratification, often taking two years to germinate), by softwood or hardwood cuttings, or by removing rooted suckers.
- Pollination
- Self-fertile but BETTER WITH A PARTNER — plant 2 cultivars
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.
Growing guide
Fertilizing. Undemanding in average garden soil; an annual spring topdressing of compost is usually enough, since excess nitrogen encourages leggy growth at the expense of flowering and fruit.
How it spreads. Suckers from the base and roots, gradually forming a broad multi-stemmed thicket if unpruned; can also be trained as a small single-trunk tree.
Growing tips. Cold-hardy to about USDA zone 2 and one of the more shade-tolerant viburnums, tolerating a wide range of soil textures, moisture, and pH, plus heat and drought once established. Not self-fertile — plant two or more seedlings or a second cultivar for reliable fruit set. Watch for viburnum leaf beetle, powdery mildew in still, humid sites, and bacterial leaf spot.
Grow journal
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