In praise of the saskatoon / serviceberry / juneberry aka Amelanchier alnifolia

All things Amelanchier alnifolia - common names include saskatoon, serviceberry, or juneberry

https://pfaf.org/user/plant.aspx?LatinName=Amelanchier+alnifolia

Their root systems are amazingly deep and resilient, so if a saskatoon has volunteered on your property, you can bet it will survive all kinds of extreme conditions.

This is a photo of saskatoon berries on the north side of our north paddock. It's never been watered there, and is thoroughly choked by ninebark bushes. The nice thing about being on the north side of a north fence is that the berries ripen later than the others on the property - season extension via micro-climate!



A friend was talking to Paul and he said, 'I have this serviceberry bush over here, and I was reading about how great these saskatoons are in this plant catalog. I'm going to replace the serviceberry with a saskatoon!'
Paul said, 'you know those are the same thing, right?'
((mic drop))


This is one of the very first pictures I took back in spring of 2013 when Paul bought the two pieces of land that make up wheaton labs. I was enchanted by these lovely blossoms!



We have these threads in other places on permies about saskatoons:
Serviceberry Tree
Hawthorn and Serviceberry/Shadbush/Saskatoon hedge
use of serviceberry wood
Saskatoon berry monoculture to permaculture conversion possible?
Strawberry, Saskatoon, Bush Cherry project
Disease on Juneberry

I love the flavor of the berries. They are now my favorite berry to use in scones after I made these in the rocket oven:



The next two pictures are from Victor's post here:


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What other bits and bobs might you have about this wonderful plant?

I've been on a pollinator kick lately, and I hear serviceberry is great for bees and other insects. I'm really excited about how drought tolerant it is too. That's also a big thing for me

I have had the worst luck with them.  It's the only thing I remember planting that I can't get to grow well.  The rabbits snip them off if I don't fence them.  The ones I fence have grown to about 2 feet after 5 years...  I'm going to try some in a new spot and see if they do better.  

Paul isn't as thrilled with the flavor of saskatoon as I am. They are a little different. A little less sweet, with seeds, though as I said above, I love them.

We have so many around here, though the birds some times get the good ones first, or in a severe drought there can be fewer, smaller berries. One year, I completely missed them (due to my attention being usurped by workshops and accounting)! I'd love more bushes around, closer to the house so I'd be more likely to notice when they're ready.

Though now I've noticed the older bushes have some sort of blight, rust or leaf spot that can affect the berries, too, making them less tasty. I might take that up in the Disease on Juneberry thread (the initial post in that thread might have been about a pest). Another good reason, IMHO, to plant more here. Maybe some will be more resistant, or not be as affected if they are in a location that they like.

I posted a few more pics of a huge service berry branch and what we did with it here.

And Paul is updating his spoon carving adventures in the use of serviceberry wood thread.

At our site they (named cultivars) did not receive any particular care and it took more than 7 years to grow to a solid size and give a good crop.

The bees work them... to some extent. They are not a big hit but not useless either. I guess this is also very dependant on how many one has planted in a single spot because bees much prefer larger targets.

The birds like them a lot. So does our dog.

The berries are excellent for fresh eating but, to my taste, somewhat questionable for further use in cooking / infusing. That's because the marzipan taste of the seeds becomes overwhelming. But I guess one day we'll have a visitor that really likes marzipan and will be overjoyed to try something like that :)

I grew up in northern British Columbia, and Saskatoons were our main berry. I love them. Pie, jam, syrup, fresh from the bush. Yum.

I love them. I have three different species around. As mentioned the bees work them but they are not mobbed.

There are the A. canadensis, which are native here and I transplant them from the woods when they look healthy if I am clearing. Berries tend to be small, but that could be that they are wild berries. They are quite hardy, I have run them over and bushhogged them by mistake and they mostly come back. They never seem to get many fruit due to the cedars around here, but it must be intermittent because they are common understory plants and there must have been seeds and fruit at some point! The few fruits I have had are very almondy in flavor.

Then the A. arborea (downy serviceberry), which I have not seen natively here, but they seem to do really well. In this climate they grow about 4' a year! The leaves seem more resistant to the rust, but most of the berries still get yucked. These are not a named cultivar.

A. alnifolia (saskatoon) has not done well here at all. This did better out west. It may need colder or drier or something unlike here. Out west that and the Utah shadberry are common in the wild and delicious. IF someone wants four of them from my yard just bring a shovel.

The best thing about them for me is that they readily root as hardwood cuttings and I can make 20 a year or more for new areas. This and goumi are the main understory plants in my schema. I have several kinds of vibernum that I wanted in that role but they are not as robust.

I give this shrub 8 out of 10 purple berries. For the record, they are tastier than Aronia by a lot in my book, but that is a similar plant for you Jocelyn. When I get berries from my mongrel aronia horde, I will send some out.

So far I’m a big fan. I have two varieties, still both small, but growing quickly once they hit their second year.  Yield in our harsh dry conditions here (Reno NV) has been pretty good.  Wife thinks they taste too mealy, but I like the variety.

Didn’t realize they would easily hardwood root; I guess it’s time to start massive propagation projects!

Saskatoon are big here in western Canada.  Large acreages have been planted commercially.  Very drought tolerant but in dry seasons
Irrigation improves productivity and berry size and quality immensely.  The rust can be a problem that is hosted on Juniper and spread
To the Saskatoon.   You can graft pear Scions on to Saskatoon.  Some Saskatoon branches must be left to grow to keep the root alive
But the pear will be dwarfed and fruit earlier.   Also works with cotoneaster and mountain ash.  

Someone MUST be working on a rust-resistant cultivar and/or hybrid of one of the many different US species of serviceberries. I want to put some in my food forest because I love them ... but I don't want to sign up for rust issues. The place I want to put them is pretty wet and also pretty shady, so either Amalanchier canadensis (better for wet) or A. laevis (better for shade) would be good, but either one might be stressed and prone to disease. (I have better spots, but they're for persimmons.) Googling hasn't found much info -- a few accounts of Autumn Brilliance potentially being somewhat resistant, and one where it's definitely susceptible (but in the PNW, so, no wonder). I'm in Connecticut.

Has anyone caught wind of a breeding project, or know of a bush near them that doesn't seem to be much affected, even though others nearby are? Any species would work if it was resistant to the main serviceberry issue.

Edited to add: I know this thread is mostly for A. alnifolia, but it's what popped up. Better than a new one!

I love them so much, for pie or just to eat (once they’re really dark). Before I moved a couple years ago, I had the best spot to pick them, where I could fill a gallon pail just staying in pretty much one spot. They are still all over the place where I live now, and easy to see in spring because they bloom so early, but I have yet to find a good thick stand of them on public land where I can pick them. Very happy to learn they are easy to propagate!

I thought you might enjoy this essay:
https://emergencemagazine.org/essay/the-serviceberry/

Here’s a video I made to help my farmers’ market customers get to know juneberries.    Funny thing is I started off calling them serviceberries and switched to juneberries and sales improved tremendously. We are east coast, piedmont of Virginia and they are a great bush for bees, birds and people. The video shows clearly what the cedar rust looks like. The good thing is I don’t worry about it too much and just pick the unaffected ones. I sell them fresh and freeze dried at the market. The taste to me is a cross between a blueberry and a grape. It isn’t my favorite because I love tart (Goumi is my favorite), but for those that love mild fruit will enjoy juneberries tremendously!

I'm trying cultivars Lee#8 and Northline. Didn't grow much at all in the first year. I wondered if it was heat. All you folks growing Service Berry in warmer climates than mine are encouraging me though!

Hopefully they do better than the Honeyberry I planted. Seems like my 5b zone is too hot for Honeyberry.

Marisa Lee wrote:

I thought you might enjoy this essay:
https://emergencemagazine.org/essay/the-serviceberry/

I love that essay! I send it to people when they ask me to explain the gift economy.

When I used to live in Ontario (Toronto) a LOT of people had serviceberries as landscaping trees (including the city) and never picked the berries. My friend and I would tour around and harvest gobs of them.

Now that I'm in BC I mostly see varieties with less fruit, and smaller. Perhaps I need to finally plant my own.

I love my Juneberries. Mine are the Amelanchier Canadensis, which blooms in April, [I believe the Alnifolia blooms in May] so if you are looking to please pollinators, this one might be a better fit for you. In Central Wisconsin, it is the first tree to bloom, and yes, the berries get ripe in June and are delicious. If both can be grown on the same parcel, you will have blooms and fruit for a longer season too. I can see these blooms from my bedroom window: The trees are bare one day, and the next you start noticing some clusters of blossoms, bright white over the gray trunks, and you feel: Ha, finally, spring has sprung!
For me, it is very valuable because I love blueberries but here, they need constant fussing to adjust the Ph. No such problem with the Canadensis. I'm not sure but it may also be hardier than the Alnifolia.
It is an *understory* tree, so you can grow it better in a mature forest than in full sunshine, provided it is not too dark there. If you have a lot of deer, you may want to protect the trunk because it has just the right 'give', just the right amount of spring,  to tempt deer to rub on the trunk without breaking. It keeps its slender trunk throughout too: I only had one that grew a little thicker than my forearm. That is a great advantage when you have these perfect fruit way up in the canopy. I grab a branch as high as I can and "walk" my fingers to the tips of the branches where the best fruit are. When I'm done, I just release my grip... and the rest can go to the birds.
After a while, the larger trunk will fail to deliver great berries, but hey you did leave all these little suckers right? they will now pick up the slack. Cut off the old trunk and you will be rewarded with half a dozen suckers. Keep the best 4-5 to cycle to be the best.

Today a learned that Saskatoon = serviceberry! They are all over the place here! The song birds love them. And my chickens! They will hop up on a branch and shimmy over until it bends and everyone can feast on the berries. And then one poor hen get's launched when they hop off.

C Murphy wrote:
When I used to live in Ontario (Toronto) a LOT of people had serviceberries as landscaping trees (including the city) and never picked the berries. My friend and I would tour around and harvest gobs of them.

Now that I'm in BC I mostly see varieties with less fruit, and smaller. Perhaps I need to finally plant my own.

I wonder if our PNW native varieties have smaller and less berries. I got two from a native plant sale in Seattle and the berries are very small, not at all what I'm seeing in the pictures posted in this thread.

We were at a lake in Idaho last summer and I was excited to find tall service berries covered with fruit. I was hoping my plants might aspire to be like those some day but maybe I should just replace them with a cultivated variety.

Jenny Wright wrote:

C Murphy wrote:
When I used to live in Ontario (Toronto) a LOT of people had serviceberries as landscaping trees (including the city) and never picked the berries. My friend and I would tour around and harvest gobs of them.

Now that I'm in BC I mostly see varieties with less fruit, and smaller. Perhaps I need to finally plant my own.

I wonder if our PNW native varieties have smaller and less berries. I got two from a native plant sale in Seattle and the berries are very small, not at all what I'm seeing in the pictures posted in this thread.

We were at a lake in Idaho last summer and I was excited to find tall service berries covered with fruit. I was hoping my plants might aspire to be like those some day but maybe I should just replace them with a cultivated variety.

I live is south eastern BC , there berries here a large and sweet if there has been the right amount of rain. Too much rain = not very sweet , too little = mealy.

There's a different species of it, Amelanchier laevis, that's so common here that many people think it's native (but in fact it's from N. America). It's even called 'Drents Krentenboompje' in Dutch, which means: currant tree from Drenthe ... and Drenthe is the region where I live!
Maybe the flowers and the berries are somewhat smaller. When the berries are ripe, I love to eat them, or make jam with them.

Ashley Cottonwood wrote:

I live is south eastern BC , there berries here a large and sweet if there has been the right amount of rain. Too much rain = not very sweet , too little = mealy.

I definitely notice a difference with the amount of rain but it's the difference of : enough rain=small and mealy or not enough rain=hard and dry like little pebbles 😂

I planted them 7 years ago and I've only ever gotten a miniscule handful of berries from them each year and it's not because of birds. Maybe they need more shade? They are in a spot that gets sun until late afternoon. Maybe I should move them to opposite side of the yard where they will get shade in the morning instead.

The saskatoons here are wild. It gets up to 45C in the Summer and August can frequently come and go without rain. I live on a southern exposed hillside at the mouth a of a valley so full sun... so a lot of sun seems to be there forte.

I live in zone 2 which has very cold winters and the saskatoons grow very well here.  On our property we have lots of wild bushes and harvest them whenever we can.  We have noticed that there are years when the frost comes at inopportune times and kills the blossoms.  This means that there will be no fruit that year.  So we try to have enough on hand to last a couple of years in order to compensate for years where there is no harvest.
Our favorite way to process them is to freeze them in bags so that they are easily removed when wanted.  They make a great topping for porridge or granola.
Another great idea is to mix them with equal portions of stewed rhubarb, add some sweetener and then heat the entire batch until it bubbles. Then can them in jars. The resulting fruit is almost like pie filling. Topped with cream, this makes a delightful dessert!

Tj Jefferson wrote:A. alnifolia (saskatoon) has not done well here at all. This did better out west. It may need colder or drier or something unlike here. Out west that and the Utah shadberry are common in the wild and delicious. IF someone wants four of them from my yard just bring a shovel.

You are in nearly exactly the same climate zone as am I, and I can report similar experience.  I planted several saskatoons, choosing this species because at least one named cultivar is available with a short, bushy growth habit.  This happened to be what I needed.  All other serviceberry varieties are understory trees, so far as I know.

While they are still growing many years later, they cannot be said to have thrived here at all, and I don't think they've ever yet fruited.  I am willing to wager that, as is the case with my own, your property is just too hot to grow these.  The nurseries say that we are just at the edge of the acceptable range, but we all know those maps are optimistic.  At the height of each summer, my serviceberries loose all of their leaves.

I will likely eventually replace all of mine, once I've identified a more suitable candidate to take their spots.  

Jeanne Barrett wrote:I live in zone 2 which has very cold winters and the saskatoons grow very well here.  On our property we have lots of wild bushes and harvest them whenever we can.  We have noticed that there are years when the frost comes at inopportune times and kills the blossoms.  This means that there will be no fruit that year.  So we try to have enough on hand to last a couple of years in order to compensate for years where there is no harvest.
Our favorite way to process them is to freeze them in bags so that they are easily removed when wanted.  They make a great topping for porridge or granola.
Another great idea is to mix them with equal portions of stewed rhubarb, add some sweetener and then heat the entire batch until it bubbles. Then can them in jars. The resulting fruit is almost like pie filling. Topped with cream, this makes a delightful dessert!

Do they really taste better than blueberries?

Hi Inge!

I'm curious if other people in Drenthe realize they are edible?

In Maastricht the city has been planting lots and lots along the paths, roads and other green spaces. I'm pretty certain just for ornament. The birds and I appreciated them though, along with the kids in my family who I introduced to the delight of foraging Juneberries.

I actually prefer them to blueberries, which says a lot as I love those too.

I moved to coastal Spain last autumn and have started food forests here. We'll be testing some Amelanchier in our projects as well, since A. ovalis is native to the Mediterranean region.

Inge Leonora-den Ouden wrote:There's a different species of it, Amelanchier laevis, that's so common here that many people think it's native (but in fact it's from N. America). It's even called 'Drents Krentenboompje' in Dutch, which means: currant tree from Drenthe ... and Drenthe is the region where I live!
Maybe the flowers and the berries are somewhat smaller. When the berries are ripe, I love to eat them, or make jam with them.

Erik van Lennep wrote:Hi Inge!

I'm curious if other people in Drenthe realize they are edible?

In Maastricht the city has been planting lots and lots along the paths, roads and other green spaces. I'm pretty certain just for ornament. The birds and I appreciated them though, along with the kids in my family who I introduced to the delight of foraging Juneberries.

I actually prefer them to blueberries, which says a lot as I love those too.

I moved to coastal Spain last autumn and have started food forests here. We'll be testing some Amelanchier in our projects as well, since A. ovalis is native to the Mediterranean region.

Inge Leonora-den Ouden wrote:There's a different species of it, Amelanchier laevis, that's so common here that many people think it's native (but in fact it's from N. America). It's even called 'Drents Krentenboompje' in Dutch, which means: currant tree from Drenthe ... and Drenthe is the region where I live!
Maybe the flowers and the berries are somewhat smaller. When the berries are ripe, I love to eat them, or make jam with them.

Hi Erik. Most people don't know they're edible. I think they are planted here (in parks) for the birds. In general people do not eat anything 'wild'. But I do (and I know a few more)

Scott Obar wrote:

Jeanne Barrett wrote:I live in zone 2 which has very cold winters and the saskatoons grow very well here.  On our property we have lots of wild bushes and harvest them whenever we can.  We have noticed that there are years when the frost comes at inopportune times and kills the blossoms.  This means that there will be no fruit that year.  So we try to have enough on hand to last a couple of years in order to compensate for years where there is no harvest.
Our favorite way to process them is to freeze them in bags so that they are easily removed when wanted.  They make a great topping for porridge or granola.
Another great idea is to mix them with equal portions of stewed rhubarb, add some sweetener and then heat the entire batch until it bubbles. Then can them in jars. The resulting fruit is almost like pie filling. Topped with cream, this makes a delightful dessert!

Do they really taste better than blueberries?

No. I mean, they taste better than huge grocery store blueberries, but not better than wild blueberries. Saskatoons are great, and I love them, but their flavor is really subtle.

I’m wondering about the variety of tastes of different varieties. I tried them for the first time last summer in south central BC. And they were terrible. Not hard and dry but just awful-tasting. I spat them out and so did the kids. I’d love to include them in my food forest here in Northern France ( and by coincidence, someone I know in the nearest town just offered me one of his bushes two days ago).
Any thoughts? Is it an acquired taste or more likely just the wild variant we were eating from?

The local native variety tastes great. The variety that got imported from a nursery tastes bland.

The serviceberries on our property are blueberry-sized and mildly sweet. They do have a lot of seeds though. It was a labor of love to harvest a gallon of them last year.

So far the best concoction with them is a jam with serviceberries (mildly sweet, subtle flavor), oregon grape berries (tartness and flavor), and our homegrown raspberries (tart, sweet, flavor). The combination makes an intensely flavored jam that we use on pancakes or as an additive to blueberry/raspberry/banana compote (sounds odd but the banana goes well with berries). I find most commercial blueberries to be mildly sweet with no real flavor so our homegrown blend helps with that.

I'm very grateful for the serviceberries and Oregon grape berries we have. They take a lot of work to harvest but it's worth it.

Joseph Lofthouse wrote:The local native variety tastes great. The variety that got imported from a nursery tastes bland.

The wild variety here also tastes great, but is very hit and miss in terms of production. If the moment of pollination isn't just right, or the rainfall isn't just right, there isn't much to harvest.

I have personally grown half a dozen tame varieties (at my old property). All were hardy, strong producers, and they have very distinct flavours ranging from smoky to citrus/blueberry to wild huckleberry. Not a single one was bland. Give me a tame saskatoon over an insipid, mealy tame blueberry (ick!) any day.

Dave Way wrote:I’m wondering about the variety of tastes of different varieties. I tried them for the first time last summer in south central BC. And they were terrible. Not hard and dry but just awful-tasting. I spat them out and so did the kids. I’d love to include them in my food forest here in Northern France ( and by coincidence, someone I know in the nearest town just offered me one of his bushes two days ago).
Any thoughts? Is it an acquired taste or more likely just the wild variant we were eating from?

Dave, I've spent several years puzzling over this question. I don't have a ton of room so I'd rather rely on the advice of others and pick right the first time. Opinions on serviceberry seem to be all over the place, though. The only conclusion I've reached is that I think the quality of the fruit must depend heavily not only on the variety, but also on some set of site-specific variables (climate? soil? rain?).

For example, I'm pretty sure Eric Toensmeier has written that his 'Regent' (A. alnifolia) serviceberries were mealy and bad and he tore them up. But I have a young 'Regent' bush and the berries have been absolutely fantastic—juicy and flavorful. I'm in Minnesota, still the same biome and a similar USDA zone as Eric, but there must be some other reason that we've had completely different experiences with the same cultivar.

Unfortunately, that doesn't leave a lot of advice to offer you other than to try some different species and cultivars. My plants started producing after 2 years, so if you have similar luck you'll get results from any experiments before too long, at least. I don't think they're an acquired taste, no. I've had berries from my own bush and from boulevard trees that are likely 'Autumn Brilliance' (A. × grandiflora) and both have been quite good. They're in very much the same camp as blueberries, mild and sweet and inoffensive. They might not turn out to be your favorite fruit but they certainly should not be "spitters".

I have a Juneberry: Amelanchier lamarckii 'Ballerina' which fruits every year, but usually the birds get most of them. I find them very tasty, like a juicy apple It is a pretty little tree, but for me is not very vigorous. It does seem to grow easily from seed, so I have been trying to get some seedlings to grow. I have a few now that need planting out somewhere. I was thinking if I had more varieties though I might get a better fruit set, or come across a more vigorous form.
I also have several saskatoons; Amelanchier canadensis, and those seem more vigorous, but I've yet to see fruit at all. I'm not sure what the problem is, since the bushes are fairly well established now and seem to flower quite well.

In KY And much of the Eastern USA, Cedar apple rust is a big issue on Amelanchier species that are not resistant, such as A. alnifolia and saskatoons.  A. Canadensis and A. grandiflora are resistant.  
Symptoms of CAR are yellow spots on the leaves and fruit, often ruining the crop.  

Inge Leonora-den Ouden wrote:There's a different species of it, Amelanchier laevis, that's so common here that many people think it's native (but in fact it's from N. America). It's even called 'Drents Krentenboompje' in Dutch, which means: currant tree from Drenthe ... and Drenthe is the region where I live!
Maybe the flowers and the berries are somewhat smaller. When the berries are ripe, I love to eat them, or make jam with them.

A few hundred kilometers south, a feral amelanchier shrub has shown up in my front garden, inside a clump of Deutzia. I think it is an Amelanchier ovalis from what I can see. I hope it will make a few berries this year !
Have a nice evening,
Oliver

I tried a couple of these 15 years ago, they didn't make it.  I want to try again.

Thanks for the information!

Bob Hartley wrote:I tried a couple of these 15 years ago, they didn't make it.  I want to try again.

Bob, what did that look like for you? Did they survive a year and peter out?

And to anyone else, how long until your saskatoons really took off? I've had some in the ground since May of 2020 and they just never seemed to thrive or grow beyond just one or two twigs. They leaf out in spring but then yellow and defoliate by late August.