Article from Bean's Trees and Shrubs Hardy in the British Isles
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'Berberis bergmanniae' from the website Trees and Shrubs Online (treesandshrubsonline.
An evergreen shrub up to 10 ft high, of dense bushy habit; young shoots yellowish grey, angular, glabrous; spines three-pronged, each prong 1⁄2 to 11⁄8 in. long. Leaves in clusters of up to five, obovate to oval, spiny toothed, tapering at the base to a very short stalk, of thick leathery texture, 11⁄2 to 2 in. long. Flowers crowded as many as fifteen together in a cluster, each on a slender stalk 1⁄4 to 1⁄2 in. long, yellow. Fruit oval, 1⁄3 in. long, black, covered with a blue-white bloom, the stalk reddish; style persisting at the top.
Native of W. China; introduced by Wilson in 1908. It has been compared with B. pruinosa especially in the vividly blue-white fruits, but that species has round, not angular, young shoots and its leaves are glaucous beneath. Related more nearly to B. julianae.
Although this species was at one time thought to be near to B. pruinosa (which, incidentally, does not always have the leaves glaucous beneath), it is not related to it, nor indeed, as was suggested, to B. julianae.