The Genus of Amelanchier has too many species to narrow down. It is likely that the plants seen here in the foothills of Camels Hump are either arborea, amabilis, bartramiana, canadensis, humilis, interior, laevis, or sanguinea species. The shrub/tree is used ornamentally in landscaping and also important for wildlife due to the berries it produces. It is a member of the rose family (Rosaceae).
Identification
- The first tree/shrub in the northern half of Vermont to bloom (maybe in all of VT).
- Five white petals per flower.
- Flowers appear in clusters of between 4 and 20 individual flowers.
- Can be in many forms. A tree up to 60 feet tall or a multi-stemmed shrub only reaching 5 feet tall.
- The bark is grey and smooth.
- The leaves are simple, alternate and usually elliptic.
- The berries (pomes) are small, round and red to purple, but turning black at maturity.
Collecting and Eating
If you have an area of forest that is thickly covered with vegetation, I recommend the following method for collecting your serviceberries. First, at the end of April or beginning of May, when the juneberry is the only flowering shrub or tree in the forest, go around and tie some ribbon to any of the trees you will want to later collect from. They are super easy to locate at this time of year, as it is the only burst of white coming from the forest. Once it is time to collect the berries, you may have a very hard time locating the little bushes.
At the start of June I recommend going to check in on your Juneberries. You don’t want to miss it! They start off as red, and slowly move to black as they ripen. Once they reach this dark color, grab a pale and start picking!
Look-a-Likes
There really is not too much in the way of look-a-likes. I think the easiest thing to confuse with it would be the cherry tree. This is because the cherry blooms around the same time as the juneberry (though it definitely does bloom after). The fruits of the cherry also mature later than those of the juneberry. However, seeing as how cherries are also edible, this is a pretty low risk misidentification.
The other shrub I would point out is honeysuckle. I believe honeysuckle could be confused with juneberry due to its early leaf out and low shrub like structure producing berries. However, honeysuckle does not bloom to mid summer and the berries come after that. So timing wise, these two cannot be confused – so long as you remember the timing.