Return to the Edible Landscape Forum
| Post a Follow-Up
top five edible shrubs
| | |
Posted by Linus7 Z9PtSWEurope (My Page) on Wed, Dec 4, 02 at 8:26
| Hi !
Which edible shrubs would you rate as you top 5 favorites ?
I´m looking for some of those and have no clues. Your opinions might put me in the right track to make my decisions on that .
You may mentions the reason of your choices . (Taste, looks , bird atraction ,etc...)
Thanks
L. |
Follow-Up Postings:
RE: top five edible shrubs
| | |
| blueberry, red currant, black currant, gooseberry, aronia, elderberry, american highbush cranberry, sea buckthorn, rugosa rose-in that order for edible fruit. All are used in our yard for landscaping. |
RE: top five edible shrubs
| | |
| Blueberry, blueberry, cranberry, lingonberry and nanking cherry. |
RE: top five edible shrubs
| | |
Blueberry -relatively low-care, no spray, few pests, tasty berries, good fall color
Saskatoon/juneberry(Amelanchier spp.)- even lower care requirement than blueberries, pretty spring bloom(though short-lived), tasty berries(if you can beat the birds to them), good fall color.
Gooseberry - relatively low maintenance - all they require is pruning every few years, tasty tart berries. That's my top three - anything beyond that is so far out of the running that they don't really rate a mention. |
RE: top five edible shrubs
| | |
Serviceberry/Juneberry- Amalanchier sp.(cant grow blueberries well in Utah - my favorite eaten fresh)
Honey Berry - edible Lonicera sp. ( best tasting)
Black Chokeberry - Aronia melanocarpa (my favorite juice)
Corneilian Cherry - Cornus mass (most beautiful fruit)
Blue Elderberry - Sambucus caerulea (awesome shrub!)
Black currant - Ribes sp. (my favorite jelly)
These are not in order. I love all of them. They tolerate my clay soil and extreme weater in central Utah. There are many cultivars and hybrids of each to choose from. Do a little research and you'll find some to fit your exact needs.
Good Luck, LJ |
RE: top five edible shrubs
| | |
RE: top five edible shrubs
| | |
When you say "edible shrub" I guess you have a height restriction in mind?
So quince and pomegranate, both easily kept to less than 8 feet, are probably out. Both set beautiful blossoms, plus quince makes wonderful jams/jellies and pomegranate makes grenadine syrup.
As for berries, I have grown Red currants, blueberries, black currants, red seedless grapes, and blackberries. Elderberry might make my list in a year or two, I am just getting ready to plant some.
Red and black currants are pretty in bloom, plus the black currants smell clovelike while blooming. The red currants in their clusters look absolutely beautiful and very tasty to eat right off the bush. Blueberries bloom very pretty too, and very tasty right off the bush plus all the other applications in cooking/drying.
Grapes look beautiful trained over an arbor, plus delicious to eat.
Hazelnuts are easily kept bushy, as in a hedgerow. Foliage is very pretty, with wavy-edged leaves. Nuts are wonderful. I love mine, they gave me good crops in Zone 7 California, now to see what they will do here in S.W. Oregon (I dug up several sideshoots and brought them with me in pots).
Well, there you have my favorites and why I love them, but I must admit that there are lots that i have never even seen or tasted, this is just from my own limited experience. Delina |
RE: top five edible shrubs
| | |
| Here's my favs...Chaenomolese (flowering quince), evergreen huckleberry, blue berry, black currant, Rosa villosa, Rosa rugosa, Honey Berry (Lonicera), Camellia sinensis (green tea Camellia). Ok, so there's eight... |
RE: top five edible shrubs
| | |
| Here goes: Pineapple guava-Feijoa sellowiana;wonderful grey green foliage, pink petals taste like candy, they melt in your month. Fruit a green oval about 3 to 4 inches long, tastes tangy,sweet like a pineapple. Fruit easy to grow here in S. Calif Natal plum - Carrisa grandiflora a Can-do-no-wrong-to shrub here in S. calif. Bright glossy green leaves. Fruit a 2" oval shape, milky red kind of Sweet fruit. Brush Cherry - (Syzygium)or Eugenia paniculata. Good evergreen tall hedge. Fruit tastes like a small apple. Kumquat -Fortunella margarita or F. crassifolia. Very sour! Skin is sweet, insides are like sucking a lemon. Taste of my childhood. Bright small orange fruit are very pretty on bush. Thats all I can think of that are shrubs Happy Eating, Jill |
RE: top five edible shrubs
| | |
| I came to this forum to ask if anyone has a favorite species of Amelanchier, since I've tasted them and would love to have one at our house. Nobody mentioned highbush cranberry, which I am also considering. Anybody have any experience with that one? Do the fruits taste good, fresh off the stem? I live in zone 5, so kumquats and guavas are out of the question. |
RE: top five edible shrubs
| | |
| Maryliz - There may be some improved cultivars of highbush cranberry that would have better flavor. Sorry I don't know very much about them but I wanted to suggest starting a new post so you'll get more responses. Also there is a post titled "Which Serviceberry" that is on about page 3 right now that might help you with amelanchiers. Best of luck. |
RE: top five edible shrubs
| | |
- Posted by Corrie 2b MB Canada (My Page) on
Tue, Jan 7, 03 at 19:32
| Here on the prairie we pick the wild highbush cranberries every year. The fruit is translucent red, juicy but very sour, with a large, flat papery seed in each berry. They are not for fresh eating. They do, however, make wonderful jelly and jam, and mix well with fruit like rhubarb or the wild chokecherries, which have not enough pectin to set on their own. Their jelling ability is highest when they have just turned red and some of the berries still look a bit yellowish. If you wait until they are very translucent and soft, they will usually still set fine by themselves, but are not strong enough to be diluted with other fruit and still get a good set. The plant is also beautiful, with maple-shaped leaves and panicles of white flowers in spring, the red berries in summer and brilliant scarlet fall colour. Corrie |
RE: top five edible shrubs
| | |
| I keep adding more edible shrubs to my landscape but I have to vote for Blueberries being the best. Tree Cherries are wonderfull and I am trying out shrub cherries this year. After Blueberries my next favorite is Red Currants, which I like to eat raw. The Red Currants are for me but the Blueberries are shared with local birds which love the fruit. Serviceberries taste like small bland blueberries to me and birds absolutely love the fruit. I added Nanking Cherries this year also because the fruit is supposed to be very good and it also atttracts birds (another reason for planting lots of fruiting shrubs around here). I have Goumi shrubs, which make a tiny sour fruit that also attracts birds, Black Aronia (good for cooking and bird attracting), different types of Elderberry (again good for cooking and bird attracting) and am adding Beach Plums this fall. |
RE: top five edible shrubs
| | |
| We have a white currant White Imperial, I think. It's very good right off the bush. It's pleasantly tart and the gets sweeter as is hangs on the bush. There are still a few hanging on and its been months. We also have red currants. Don't remember the variety but the white are much sweeter. The red ones that are still on the bush are sweeter than the ones we ate earlier. Blueberries are the very best, serviceberries next, then gooseberries and currants. Our gooseberries are Achilles and are delicious. My Cornelian cherry has fruit for the first time and I don't think it's going to ripen. It's still hard and green. |
RE: top five edible shrubs
| | |
| 1) Black raspberry. (not blackberries!) My number one favorite. Easy to grow, you don't have to take care of it, you pick as much as you want and the birds can have the rest. Mourning doves nested in the ones at my old house. 2) Blueberry. My mom planted some this year. So far, so good, but no berries 'til next year. Pretty plant, though, which is something the raspberries can't say. 3) Rugosa Roses. Lovely (edible) flowers, useful fruit, good wildlife plant. Better scent than many hybrid roses. 4) Red raspberries. They taste different from the black ones to me. Still in the top five, though somewhat down the list. Prettier for jellies, too. 5) Does crabapple count as a shrub? ;) |
RE: top five edible shrubs
| | |
| I am trying a Hinnomaki Red Gooseberry this year. Blueberries are still my number one favorite, so much so that I am getting 9 more plants shipped to me next week. |
RE: top five edible shrubs
| | |
| Do you eat the black rasberries fresh or are they only good for jam making? |
RE: top five edible shrubs
| | |
| Lately I have gone crazy for Bramble Fruit, adding Red and Yellow Everbearing Raspberries, Blackberries and Black Raspberries to the garden this year. So right now they are top of my list! |
RE: top five edible shrubs
| | |
Aceola-Pretty, very tasty, bears lightly for a long time.
Feijoa-VERY pretty, edible flowers and fruit.
Fig-Yum!
Black Suranam Cherry-Ooh, so good. Very pretty bush. Tastes like being a kid in summer again.
Jamacan Cherry-Well, tecnically a tree, but you can keep it bush sized and the fruit is wonderful! But I am pretty sure most of these won't grow for most of you. |
RE: top five edible shrubs
| | |
| This year I have given up on growing a vegetable garden and am devoting my time establishing a fruit garden. What is going in is Triple Crown thornless blackberries, several kinds of grapes, bush cherries, elderberries and more gooseberries. Don't need to plant currents, they grow wild all over the place. For ground cover, I will be putting in strawberries. Any other suggestions for a high desert fruit garden? |
RE: top five edible shrubs
| | |
| Blue berry, black raspberry, raspberry, service berries, gooseberries and black currants. |
RE: top five edible shrubs - Black Raspberries
| | |
| Black raspberries are wonderful fresh eating. generally, I prefer them to most of the reds. I used to grow and export them to the US from Chile. Michael |
RE: top five edible shrubs
| | |
I used to eat the service berries, until I found the hucks and now wouldn't waste my time on service berries again, the are a weed around here. I like blueberries even better than the hucks, they are alot easier to grow too. With all the wild plum, sand cherries, elderberry, currants, chokecherry, and chokeberry around why would anyone eat service berries on purpose.
Just my thoughts on the seedy, bland service berries.
Robert |
RE: top five edible shrubs
| | |
| Morus nigra 'Black Beauty' the best mulberry (so they say, mine hasn't fruited yet). Left to it's own devices it's suposed to top out at 15' but with summer pruning kept to 10' or so (maybe smaller, maybe not). The other mulberries are pretty much full on shade trees. You can "shrub" just about any of the grafted stone fruits and apples too. Pomegranites can be kept smaller too. |
RE: top five edible shrubs
| | |
| Strawberry quava -- needs no maintenance; rosemary, drought tolerant; any citrus kept to shrub size, Japanese persimmon, chickasaw plum trimmed to shrube size (no maitenance, self-fertilizing.) |
|
|
|
|
