Features
Common winterberry is a deciduous holly native to eastern North America where it grows in swamps, damp thickets, low woods, bogs, and along ponds and stream banks. Unlike evergreen hollies, it drops its leaves in autumn, leaving the bright red berries highly visible on bare stems through winter. Plants form an upright to rounded, multi-stemmed shrub with toothed green leaves and small, inconspicuous greenish-white flowers from late spring to early summer.
Winterberry is highly valued for its heavy crop of colorful fruit and its usefulness in wildlife gardens. The berries provide an important food source for birds and small mammals in late fall and winter, and the flowers support pollinators. Plants are dioecious, meaning male and female flowers occur on separate plants, so at least one compatible male plant is needed nearby to pollinate female plants and produce berries.
The common name “winterberry” refers to the showy red berries that persist on the shrub into winter after the leaves have fallen. Note that the berries are mildly poisonous to humans and some domestic animals and should not be consumed by people or pets.
Uses
Excellent for native plantings, wildlife gardens, bird gardens, rain gardens, pond or stream edges, moist shrub borders, hedges, screens, foundation plantings, and winter-interest gardens. Great naturalized along the border of moist woodlands.
0 Comments