This native plant grows throughout the central and eastern portions of North America. When you can identify it, leave a comment with its common and scientific names. And share any personal connection you may have with the plant.
Dying flowers and young berries
Spring leaves
Summer leaves — top and underside
Stem
Group of plants
Fruits
ANSWER (subsequently added to this post to facilitate the “search” function for these images): Black raspberry (Rubus occidentalis)
Wild Black Rasberry
Rubus occidentalis
This is Black Raspberry, Rubus occidentalis. As a child growing up in the Finger Lakes region of New York, I used to pick these berries in the wild. We sprinkled them on ice cream for dessert, and once my sister and I made a pie with them — but only once because it was so full of seeds!
Black raspberry (Rubus occidentalis). These plants grow wild in PA along road sides or tree lines. (Some orchards grow for “pick your own”)
Black raspberry jam is a special treat I make for my Mother for her birthday. She prefers it to be seedless. It is a lot of work separating juice and seed — but well worth the effort & much appreciated by the eater.
These berry have a pretty short harvesting season and do not keep long in the fridge. You need to be quick picking and freeze for later use. Very thorny canes and the berries juice stains your finger a very pretty deep purple (o:
This is a black raspberry plant, Rubus occidentalis. I have many canes of black raspberry in my backyard in Pennsylvania. Our favorite way of using it is in black raspberry smoothies and milkshakes. Only a couple of quarts made it into my freezer for later enjoyment.
This fruit is a glossy round with somewhat of a purple tinge and in fact looks mighty juicy; best yet it’s appears to be growing horizontally so Dr. Watson and I would presume this is a bybrid cross between a blackberry, a loganberry and a raspberry. Yes the chase is then on for some of these delicious boysenberrys.
The waxy bloom on the stem is actually a wild yeast. We used it last year to leaven bread and make our own miniature pizzas.
Hi Mike,
That’s really cool, I had no idea. I poked around on the internet in search of more information on this, but couldn’t find any. Are there any sources you could point me to with more about this yeast? Thanks!
Agreed , it is Rubus occidentalis
Black Raspberry, we make loads of jam every year
Yes, this is Black raspberry (Rubus occidentalis). It’s one of the wonderful wild edible berries which ripen mid-summer.
Yes. Delightfully delicious, the wild black raspberry plays a major roll in my happy farm memories as a youth.
My mom, grandma and I went to the woods with buckets to pick berries for pie and jam, and Misty Lou, our German Shepherd went with us, as she always did on our outings to gather hickory nuts, black walnuts, hazel nuts, or whatever. Mom turned around and saw Misty Lou with her head in the bucket helping herself. Mom said “Misty Lou! go pick your own berries!” So, with dog lips already purple and juicy, she did just that, and began to pick berries from a stickery bush all by herself.
My dogs, one in particular, also enjoyed picking berries directly from the thorny plants. It was funny to watch the delicate way this large dog approached and picked the berry to eat it.