The Cranberry

Another belated Friday’s seeds would have been unacceptable, so a plant portrait instead (seeds included ;) about the cranberry – Vaccinium macrocarpon, American cranberry.

The Cranberry is a North American symbol. If you have the chance to hike in northern region you’ll have the chance to see it growing wild, most often on wet areas on acidic substrates. First time I encounter it, I wondered how many people actually know how the plant looks like, despite the fact they often eat the fruits dried/fresh and also as part of other products?

Vaccinium macrocarpon fruit

It is very surprising to see that the large fruits are formed on thin, graceful trailing branches. Is this indeed The Cranberry? (shown in the picture trailing on a sphagnum moss carpet during the fall).

Vaccinium macrocarpon, growing over a sphagnum moss carpet in the fall

Yes, it is; after all ‘macrocarpon’ means ‘large fruit’. So, it is a small size plant with big fruits :)
Another species, Vaccinium oxycoccos, the small cranberry, is very similar and distinguishable by its pointed leaves (and few other details). The cranberries are specific wetlands species: they grow on swamps, fens, and occasionally on glacial deposits in kettle holes on shorelines (like shown in the picture). Usually will form mats on Sphagnum moss. The leaves are shiny green/glaucous beneath and turn bright red in the fall. 

In Canada, the American cranberry can be found from Manitoba to Newfoundland, and south into the mid-western and eastern U.S. Probably in some areas the fruits are still collected in the wild but most came from commercial operations now. It was one of the first medicinal plant crop to be grown commercially in the U.S.; maybe in Canada as well.

Traditionally, Indigenous People have gathered and consumed the fresh fruits for their vitamin C content and also used them dried and mixed with fat/dried meat and fish.
To note only few of the more ‘modern’ utilizations: juice and pie making, jams, dried fruits, and in many naturopathic preparations (mostly for bladder and kidney infections).

Have a bog/wet, acidic area in the garden? – do not hesitate to grow this lovely North American shrub!