Sambucus canadensis-Black elderberry

Description

Elderberry likes sun to part shade, loamy soils with good moisture retention; flowers attract interesting wasp and fly (Hymenopteran) type pollinators. BB sized, dark bluish black, tart berries are ravenously consumed by birds. Elderberry has a very impressive list of health and nutritive benefits that have been utilized for centuries including proven protection against colds and flu. A suckering cane-type shrub forming small colonies that can grow up to 10 feet tall when fully satisfied. Even though elderberry is not typically considered a cane fruit, like raspberries, you can treat elderberry similarly by cutting out the older canes every 3 or 4 years, which will stimulate new growth and increase fruit production.

Commercial elderberry orchards have been established over the last few decades across the eastern United States using high berry yield cultivars, hoping to cash in on the “elderberry wave”. (It’s nice to see our native plants in the spotlight, instead of some tropical wonder fruit that has to be shipped in from continents away.) Native fruit production matches well to our local environment, probably requiring less resources like water, fertilizer, and pesticides. In fact, many of our native plants have “generously” contributed wholly or genetically to commercialized niche fruit markets; high and low bush blueberries (our native highbush blueberries are now being grown in South America to satisfy winter demand), Aronia (first commercially grown in Russia and eastern Europe!), wild strawberry (genetics from our sweet little Fragaria virginiana are in many common commercial varieties), fox grape (‘Concord’ grape was a variety selected from thousands of grown out fox grape seedlings over a hundred years ago), and cranberries. There are really interesting stories behind all of them, particularly Aronia, fox grape, and wild strawberry.

15″-18″ high, 2 gallon pot size; $32 each.