Vaccinium vacillans
Credits
Article from Bean's Trees and Shrubs Hardy in the British Isles
Recommended citation
'Vaccinium vacillans' from the website Trees and Shrubs Online (treesandshrubsonline.
Genus
Synonyms
- V. torreyanum Camp
Other taxa in genus
- Vaccinium angustifolium
- Vaccinium arboreum
- Vaccinium arctostaphylos
- Vaccinium bracteatum
- Vaccinium caespitosum
- Vaccinium canadense
- Vaccinium corymbosum
- Vaccinium crassifolium
- Vaccinium delavayi
- Vaccinium duclouxii
- Vaccinium dunalianum
- Vaccinium erythrocarpum
- Vaccinium floribundum
- Vaccinium fragile
- Vaccinium glauco-album
- Vaccinium hirsutum
- Vaccinium × intermedium
- Vaccinium japonicum
- Vaccinium macrocarpum
- Vaccinium membranaceum
- Vaccinium moupinense
- Vaccinium myrsinites
- Vaccinium myrtillus
- Vaccinium nummularia
- Vaccinium oldhamii
- Vaccinium ovalifolium
- Vaccinium ovatum
- Vaccinium oxycoccus
- Vaccinium padifolium
- Vaccinium parvifolium
- Vaccinium praestans
- Vaccinium stamineum
- Vaccinium uliginosum
- Vaccinium urceolatum
- Vaccinium virgatum
- Vaccinium vitis-idaea
A deciduous shrub, 1 to 4 ft high, with mostly glabrous, yellowish green, warted branchlets. Leaves mostly oval to obovate, 1 to 2 in. long, about half as wide, nearly entire, or minutely toothed except towards the base, very shortly stalked, minutely pointed, glabrous, firm, pale or glaucous beneath. Flowers produced during May in short clusters on the leafless tips of the previous year’s shoots. Corolla greenish, pink or purplish, about 1⁄4 in. long; calyx often reddish. Berries roundish, 1⁄4 to 1⁄3 in. wide, black, usually covered with a blue bloom, very sweet.
Native of the eastern United States from Maine southwards to Georgia. This is a stiffly branched species with firm textured leaves, and is one of the most ornamental in its flowers, which, like the fruits, cover the terminal (and naked) 2 or 3 in. of the twigs. Said to favour dryish situations in the wild.