The Hackberry Family: Great Wildlife Trees
Hackberries (Celtis sp.) are medium-sized trees with excellent wildlife value. Related to the elm family, they produce small, sweet fruits that are popular with many song birds, game birds, and small mammals. Hackberries are also edible by humans and …
The Versatile Viburnum Family
The viburnums (Viburnum sp.) are a large and versatile family of over 150 ornamental shrubs, including both native and introduced species. Like their fellow understory shrubs, the dogwoods, viburnums provide exceptional four season beauty. They produce prolific and …
The Wintergreen Family
The wintergreen family (Gaultheria spp.) is a family of evergreen shrubs and woody groundcovers native mainly to northern and mountainous regions of North America.
Oil of wintergreen (methyl salicylate) is produced in the leaves and twigs of Gaultheria species …
The Mountain Ash Family
Mountain ash trees (Sorbus species) have long been considered to have special properties. European mountain ashes are also known as rowan trees and were traditionally considered to have magical properties, including protection against evil beings. They were often used as …
The Lovely Crabapple
Like their more famous relative, the Domestic Apple (Malus domestica), which is a descendant of a wild apple (Malus sieversii) native to Central Asia, crabapples provide beautiful (and often fragrant) white or pink blossoms and edible …
The Messy and Delicious Mulberry
In recent years, the mulberry family (Morus sp.) has lost some popularity as an ornamental plant due to the messy berries, which resemble blackberries and (like blackberries) stain sidewalks, clothes, and more. However, for many years mulberries were tremendously …
The Blueberry Family: American Treasures
Blueberry enthusiasts are fond of pointing out that the old saying “as American as apple pie” should really be “as American as blueberry pie.” Unlike apples, blueberries are one of relatively few native American fruits that have no equivalent in …
The Blackberry Family: Juicy and Delicious
The large and diverse blackberry family (Rubus sp.) includes blackberries, raspberries, dewberries, salmonberries, and many hybrids and combinations of various North American and Eurasian species and cultivars, including the loganberry (raspberry x blackberry), the boysenberry (loganberry x raspberry x …
The Delicious Elderberry
Elderberries (Sambucus sp.) are best known for their berries, which are made into delicious jellies, pies, syrups, and wines. Elderberries have been receiving a lot of attention recently due to their extremely high vitamin C content.
Elderberries are also …