Rubus bifrons
Vest ex Tratt.
Himalayan Berry
(c) J Brew, some rights reserved (CC BY-SA), uploaded by J Brew
(c) hchrish200, some rights reserved (CC BY-NC)
(c) hchrish200, some rights reserved (CC BY-NC)
What to Eat
Edible parts: Fruit
The fruit, up to 20mm long, is possibly eaten raw or cooked.
Dangerous Lookalikes
This plant can be confused with the following toxic species. Always verify identification carefully before consuming any wild plant.
Red Baneberry: Short herbaceous plant (no thorns), berries on thick red stems, each berry has a single seed, compound sharply-toothed leaves.
Himalayan Berry: Thorny woody canes (brambles), aggregate berry made of many drupelets, berries pull easily from receptacle.
Where to Find It
It is a temperate plant.
Britain, Europe, Luxembourg,
How to Identify
A deciduous shrub reaching 1.5 m tall with hermaphroditic flowers pollinated by insects. Reproduces by apomictic seeds without sexual fusion and is self-fertile. Tolerates light sandy, medium loamy, and heavy clay soils with good drainage. Grows in mildly acid to basic pH and thrives in semi-shade or full sun with consistently moist conditions.
How to Grow
Easily grown in a good well-drained loamy soil in sun or semi-shade. According to the Flora Europaea this species is native to Britain, but it is not in The Flora of the British Isles. This species is a blackberry with biennial stems, it produces a number of new stems each year from the perennial rootstock, these stems fruit in their second year and then die. The plant produces apomictic flowers, these produce fruit and viable seed without fertilization, each seedling is a genetic copy of the parent. Plants in this genus are notably susceptible to honey fungus.
Propagation: Seed requires stratification and is best sown in early autumn in a cold frame. Stored seed needs one month of stratification at around 3°c and should be sown as early in the year as possible. Prick out seedlings once large enough to handle and grow on in a cold frame before planting out into permanent positions in late spring of the following year. Cuttings of half-ripe wood can be taken in July or August in a frame. Tip layering in July, planting out in autumn. Division in early spring or just before leaf-fall in autumn.
Medicinal Uses
None known.
Other Uses
A purple to dull blue dye is obtained from the fruit.
Wikipedia
Source ↗Rubus bifrons, the European blackberry or Himalayan blackberry, is a European species of flowering plant in the rose family. It is widespread across much of Europe and naturalized in scattered parts of North America. It is sometimes considered to include the species R. armeniacus. Rubus bifrons is a spiny shrub up to 50 cm (20 inches) tall. Stems are biennial, arching, sometimes creeping. Leaves are palmately compound with three or five leaflets. Flowers are white or pink, in large arrays at the ends of branches, sometimes containing as many as 100 flowers. Fruits are black.
Notes
There are about 250 Rubus species.
References (2)
- Plants for a Future database, The Field, Penpol, Lostwithiel, Cornwall, PL22 0NG, UK. http://www.scs.leeds.ac.uk/pfaf/
- Rosac. monogr. 3:28. 1823
More from Rosaceae
