Vaccinium angustifolium

Last updated

Lowbush blueberry
Vaccinium angustifolium, Pancake Bay PP.jpg
Pancake Bay Provincial Park, Ontario
Scientific classification OOjs UI icon edit-ltr.svg
Kingdom: Plantae
Clade: Tracheophytes
Clade: Angiosperms
Clade: Eudicots
Clade: Asterids
Order: Ericales
Family: Ericaceae
Genus: Vaccinium
Species:
V. angustifolium
Binomial name
Vaccinium angustifolium
Aiton 1789 not Benth. 1840 [1]
Synonyms [2]
  • Cyanococcus angustifolium(Aiton) Rydb.
  • Vaccinium nigrum(Alph. Wood) Britton

Vaccinium angustifolium, commonly known as the wild lowbush blueberry, is a species of blueberry native to eastern and central Canada (from Manitoba to Newfoundland) and the northeastern United States, growing as far south as the Great Smoky Mountains and west to the Great Lakes region. [3] [4] Vaccinium angustifolium is the most common species of the commercially used wild blueberries and is considered the "low sweet" berry. [5]

Contents

Etymology

The species epithet angustifolium is a combination of the Latin words angustum meaning 'narrow', and folium meaning 'leaf'.

Description

V. angustifolium growing in a forest of another fire-adapted species, Pinus banksiana Pinus banksiana forest.jpg
V. angustifolium growing in a forest of another fire-adapted species, Pinus banksiana

Vaccinium angustifolium is a low spreading deciduous shrub growing 5 to 60 cm (2 to 24 in) tall. [6] Its rhizomes can lie dormant up to 100 years, and when given the adequate amount of sunlight, soil moisture, and oxygen content they will sprout.[ citation needed ] The leaves are glossy blue-green in summer, turning a variety of reds in the fall. The leaf shape is broad to elliptical. Buds are brownish red in stem axils. The flowers are white or pink, [7] bell-shaped, 4 to 6 mm (0.16 to 0.24 in) long. The fruit is a small sweet dark blue to black berry, full of antioxidants and flavonoids. This plant grows best in wooded areas, old abandoned farmyards or open areas with well-drained acidic soils. In some areas it produces natural blueberry barrens, where it is practically the only species covering large areas. [8]

Several buds may be on a healthy stem, and each bud can open up and have several blossoms. A blueberry field that has full plant coverage can have as many as 150 million blossoms per acre.

The Vaccinium angustifolium plant is fire-tolerant, and its numbers often increase in an area following a forest fire. Traditionally, blueberry growers burn their fields every few years to eliminate shrubs and fertilize the soil. In Acadian French, a blueberry field is known as a brûlis (from brûlé 'burnt') because of that technique, which is still in use.

Distribution and habitat

The lowbush blueberry is native to central and eastern Canada as well as north-central and eastern United States. [9] In its native habitat the plant grows in open conifer woods, old fields, and sandy or rocky balds. [10]

Geographical change

Glacier ice from the Ice Age sculpted the Maine landscape and is responsible for creating some of the most productive Vaccinium angustifolium habitats. [11]

Ecology

Many animals feed on the fruit and foliage of the lowbush berry, some of which include black bears, racoons, foxes, white-tailed deer and birds. [6]

Its leaves are also popular among caterpillars. It is a larval host to the pale tiger moth, the peppered moth, [12] the chain-dotted geometer, the saw-wing moth, the blueberry gray moth, the mousy angle moth, [13] Caloptilia vacciniella , Andromeda underwing, the shadowy arches, the two-spot dart, [14] the dingy cutworm moth, the speckled cutworm, [15] the decorated owlet, the pirate looper, Norman's dart, the gray swordgrass moth, the pink-edged sulphur butterfly, the pawpaw sphinx moth, and the blueberry leaftier moth.

Production cycle

Vaccinium angustifolium has a two year production cycle. [16] The first year is known as the vegetative year and the second is known as the fruit-bearing year.

In order to be productive each year, most farmers divide their land to have half their crop in the vegetative year while the other half is in the fruit-bearing year. [17]

Pruning

Native Americans regularly burned away trees and shrubs in parts of eastern Maine to stimulate blueberry production. Modern farmers use various methods of burning or mowing to accomplish this. [18] There are several methods growers use to stimulate blueberry production on their land, such as burning the land or using a flail mower, bush hog, lawnmower, etc. to cut the plants off as close to the ground as possible without scalping the land. These procedures are used to promote the spreading of rhizomes under the soil. Some growers use a sickle bar mower in the fall after the crop has been harvested to mow the plants off, leaving roughly 1 to 2 inches of stem so the growers can then burn the remainder of the plants in the spring, using less fuel for the fire.

Farmers then treat their crops with pesticides to control weeds and insects. [19] The fields are then left for new growth to emerge, develop, and flourish for the remainder of the year.

Pollination

During the harvest or fruit bearing year, blueberry growers rent honey bee hives to put in their fields for pollination. These hives are placed in the fields at a density range of anywhere from 1-8 hives per acre. The hives are placed in the fields at 10-20% bloom allowing the bees to have enough forage rather than going elsewhere to forage. Hives are left in blueberry fields for 2 weeks on average, allowing the bees to pollinate the variety of clones in the field, all of which bloom at different times during the two-week period.

Some growers also use bumble bees as well in hopes of maximum pollination. Bumblebees will fly in colder and wetter weather conditions than the honey bee will, and they also pollinate in a different way than the honey bee. Bumblebees can sonicate the flowers, which releases pollen from deep inside the poricidal anthers. This is known as buzz-pollination.

Blueberry growers also rely on many wild bees for pollination, including solitary bees like Andrena carlini and Colletes inaequalis. [20]

State fruits

Giant blueberry person in Oxford, Nova Scotia OxfordGiantBlueberry Night.jpg
Giant blueberry person in Oxford, Nova Scotia

The lowbush blueberry is the state fruit of Maine, [21] and the wild low bush blueberry is also the Nova Scotian Provincial Berry. [22] Oxford, Nova Scotia is nicknamed "Wild Blueberry Capital of Canada". [23] Maine's state dessert is blueberry pie made with wild blueberries. [24]

Related Research Articles

<i>Vaccinium</i> Genus of berry-producing shrubs in the heath family

Vaccinium is a common and widespread genus of shrubs or dwarf shrubs in the heath family (Ericaceae). The fruits of many species are eaten by humans and some are of commercial importance, including the cranberry, blueberry, bilberry (whortleberry), lingonberry (cowberry), and huckleberry. Like many other ericaceous plants, they are generally restricted to acidic soils.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Fruit tree pollination</span>

Pollination of fruit trees is required to produce seeds with surrounding fruit. It is the process of moving pollen from the anther to the stigma, either in the same flower or in another flower. Some tree species, including many fruit trees, do not produce fruit from self-pollination, so pollinizer trees are planted in orchards.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Pollination management</span> Horticultural practices to enhance pollination

Pollination management is the horticultural practices that accomplish or enhance pollination of a crop, to improve yield or quality, by understanding of the particular crop's pollination needs, and by knowledgeable management of pollenizers, pollinators, and pollination conditions.

<i>Vaccinium virgatum</i> Berry and plant

Vaccinium virgatum is a species of blueberry native to the Southeastern United States, from North Carolina south to Florida and west to Texas.

<i>Vaccinium corymbosum</i> Species of plant

Vaccinium corymbosum, the northern highbush blueberry, is a North American species of blueberry which has become a food crop of significant economic importance. It is native to eastern Canada and the eastern and southern United States, from Ontario east to Nova Scotia and south as far as Florida and eastern Texas. It is also naturalized in other places: Europe, Japan, New Zealand, the Pacific Northwest of North America, etc. Other common names include blue huckleberry, tall huckleberry, swamp huckleberry, high blueberry, and swamp blueberry.

<i>Vaccinium myrtilloides</i> Berry and plant

Vaccinium myrtilloides is a shrub with common names including common blueberry, velvetleaf huckleberry, velvetleaf blueberry, Canadian blueberry, and sourtop blueberry. It is common in much of North America, reported from all 10 Canadian provinces plus Nunavut and Northwest Territories, as well as from the northeastern and Great Lakes states in the United States. It is also known to occur in Montana and Washington.

<i>Vaccinium darrowii</i> Berry and plant

Vaccinium darrowii, with the common names Darrow's blueberry, evergreen blueberry, scrub blueberry, is a species of Vaccinium in the blueberry group.

<i>Habropoda laboriosa</i> Species of bee

Habropoda laboriosa, the southeastern blueberry bee, is a bee in the family Apidae. It is native to the eastern United States. It is regarded as the most efficient pollinator of southern rabbiteye blueberries, because the flowers require buzz pollination, and H. laboriosa is one of the few bees that exhibit this behavior. It is active for only a few weeks of the year, while the blueberries are in flower during early spring, when the temperature is warm and humid. H. laboriosa are solitary bees that live alone but nest in close proximity with other nests of their species. They have similar features to bumble bees, but they are smaller in size compared to them. H. laboriosa are arthropods so they have segmented bodies that are composed of the head, thorax, and abdomen.

<i>Exobasidium vaccinii</i> Species of fungus

Exobasidium vaccinii, commonly known as “red leaf disease,” or “Azalea Gall,” is a biotrophic species of fungus that causes galls on ericaceous plant species, such as blueberry and azalea. Exobasidium vaccinii is considered the type species of the Exobasidium genus. As a member of the Ustilagomycota, it is a basidiomycete closely related to smut fungi. Karl Wilhelm Gottlieb Leopold Fuckel first described the species in 1861 under the basionym Fusidium vaccinii, but in 1867 Mikhail Stepanovich Voronin later placed it in the genus Exobasidium. The type specimen is from Germany, and it is held in the Swedish Museum of Natural History. Exobasidium vaccinii, in current definition from John Axel Nannfeldt in 1981, is limited on the host Vaccinium vitis-idaea. This idea is used in most recent papers on E. vaccinii.

<i>Rhagoletis mendax</i> Species of fly

Rhagoletis mendax is a species of tephritid fruit fly known by the common name blueberry maggot. The blueberry maggot is closely related to the apple maggot, a larger fruit fly in the same genus. It is a major pest of plant species in the Ericaceae family, such as blueberry, cranberry, and huckleberry. The larva is 5 to 8 mm long, apodous, and white with chewing mouthparts. Female adults are 4.75 mm in length, males are slightly smaller. Both adults are mostly black in color with white stripes, orange-red eyes, and a single pair of clear wings with black banding. The adult female fly lays a single egg per blueberry, and when the larva hatches it consumes the fruit, usually finishing the entire berry in under 3 weeks and rendering it unmarketable. The larva then falls to the soil and pupates. Adult flies emerge, mate, and females oviposit when blueberry plants are producing fruit. Each female fly can lay 25 to 100 eggs in their lifetime.

<i>Vaccinium stamineum</i> Species of flowering plant

Vaccinium stamineum, commonly known as deerberry, tall deerberry, highbush huckleberry, buckberry, and southern gooseberry, is a species of flowering plant in the heath family. It is native to North America, including Ontario, the eastern and central United States, and parts of Mexico. It is most common in the southeastern United States.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Blueberry</span> Section of plants

Blueberry is a widely distributed and widespread group of perennial flowering plant with blue or purple berries. They are classified in the section Cyanococcus within the genus Vaccinium. Vaccinium also includes cranberries, bilberries, huckleberries and Madeira blueberries. Commercial blueberries—both wild (lowbush) and cultivated (highbush)—are all native to North America. The highbush varieties were introduced into Europe during the 1930s.

<i>Acrobasis vaccinii</i> Species of moth

Acrobasis vaccinii, the cranberry fruitworm, is a moth of the family Pyralidae described by Charles Valentine Riley in 1884. It is found in North America from Nova Scotia to Florida and from Wisconsin to Texas, it is introduced in the state of Washington.

<i>Vaccinium membranaceum</i> Species of plant

Vaccinium membranaceum is a species within the group of Vaccinium commonly referred to as huckleberry. This particular species is known by the common names thinleaf huckleberry, tall huckleberry, big huckleberry, mountain huckleberry, square-twig blueberry, and (ambiguously) as "black huckleberry".

<i>Vaccinium pallidum</i> Berry and plant

Vaccinium pallidum is a species of flowering plant in the heath family known by the common names hillside blueberry, Blue Ridge blueberry, late lowbush blueberry, and early lowbush blueberry. It is native to central Canada (Ontario) and the central and eastern United States plus the Ozarks of Missouri, Arkansas, southeastern Kansas and eastern Oklahoma.

<i>Blueberry shoestring virus</i> Species of virus

Blueberry shoestring virus (BBSSV) is a disease-causing virus that is commonly transmitted by the aphid vector, Illinoia pepperi. The blueberry shoestring virus disease is very prominent in highbush and lowbush blueberry plants in the northeastern and upper Midwest of the United States. Symptoms can vary significantly depending on the environment, but the most common disease symptoms are reddish streaking on young stems, reduced vigor and strap-shaped leaves. The blueberry shoestring virus disease can be managed by eliminating the aphid vector through the use of biological, chemical or cultural controls. In severe cases, the disease leads to an extensive loss of yield and marketable fruit.

The Blueberry leaf mottle virus (BLMV) is a Nepovirus that was first discovered in Michigan in 1977. It has also appeared in New York, eastern Canada, Bulgaria, Hungary, and Portugal.

Blueberry shock virus (BlShV) is an Ilarvirus belonging to the Bromoviridae family. The Bromoviridae family contains single-stranded, positive-sense RNA viruses. Virus particles are icosahedral and 30 nm in diameter. Blueberry shock virus causes shock of blueberries in Oregon, Washington, and British Columbia. It gets its name because plants are shocked by the initial infection, meaning the flowers and foliage blight and wilt in the early spring, right when the plant is in full bloom. BIShV was first discovered in a blueberry field containing highbush blueberry in Washington in 1991. It continued to spread to Oregon, Washington and British Columbia since that time. In 2009, the disease was found in a western Michigan field, and may be preset in Pennsylvania as of 2011. Since its discovery, eradication is in progress to eliminate the disease and reduce loss of yield from it.

<i>Colletes validus</i> Species of bee

Colletes validus, colloquially known as the blueberry cellophane bee, is a solitary, specialist bee in the family Colletidae. It is found primarily in eastern North America where it nests in sandy soils near ericaceous plants.

Lowbush berry may refer to:

References

  1. "Vaccinium angustifolium". Tropicos . Missouri Botanical Garden.
  2. "Vaccinium angustifolium". World Checklist of Selected Plant Families . Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew via The Plant List. Note that this website has been superseded by World Flora Online
  3. USDA, NRCS (n.d.). "Vaccinium angustifolium". The PLANTS Database (plants.usda.gov). Greensboro, North Carolina: National Plant Data Team. Retrieved 2013-08-04.
  4. "Vaccinium angustifolium". County-level distribution map from the North American Plant Atlas (NAPA). Biota of North America Program (BONAP). 2014.
  5. "About Maine Wild Blueberry - Cooperative Extension: Maine Wild Blueberries - University of Maine Cooperative Extension". Cooperative Extension: Maine Wild Blueberries. Retrieved 2022-11-30.
  6. 1 2 Tirmenstein, D. A. (1991). "Vaccinium angustifolium". Fire Effects Information System (FEIS). US Department of Agriculture (USDA), Forest Service (USFS), Rocky Mountain Research Station, Fire Sciences Laboratory.
  7. "About Maine Wild Blueberry - Cooperative Extension: Maine Wild Blueberries - University of Maine Cooperative Extension". Cooperative Extension: Maine Wild Blueberries. Retrieved 2022-11-30.
  8. Vander Kloet, Sam P. (2009). "Vaccinium angustifolium". In Flora of North America Editorial Committee (ed.). Flora of North America North of Mexico (FNA). Vol. 8. New York and Oxford: Oxford University Press via eFloras.org, Missouri Botanical Garden, St. Louis, MO & Harvard University Herbaria, Cambridge, MA.
  9. "Vaccinium angustifolium Aiton | Plants of the World Online | Kew Science". Plants of the World Online. Retrieved 2022-10-08.
  10. "Lady Bird Johnson Wildflower Center - The University of Texas at Austin". www.wildflower.org. Retrieved 2022-10-08.
  11. "Geological History and Climate Change | Wild Blueberry Heritage Center" . Retrieved 2022-11-30.
  12. "Species Biston betularia - Pepper & Salt Geometer - Hodges#6640". bugguide.net.
  13. "Species Macaria argillacearia - Mousy Angle Moth - Hodges#6282". bugguide.net.
  14. "Species Eueretagrotis perattentus - Two-spot Dart Moth - Hodges#11008". bugguide.net.
  15. "Species Lacanobia subjuncta - Speckled Cutworm - Hodges#10299". bugguide.net.
  16. "Two-Year Wild Blueberry Production Cycle - Cooperative Extension: Maine Wild Blueberries - University of Maine Cooperative Extension". Cooperative Extension: Maine Wild Blueberries. Retrieved 2022-11-30.
  17. "About Maine Wild Blueberry - Cooperative Extension: Maine Wild Blueberries - University of Maine Cooperative Extension". Cooperative Extension: Maine Wild Blueberries. Retrieved 2022-11-30.
  18. "The University of Maine - Cooperative Extension: Maine Wild Blueberries - 229-Pruning Lowbush Blueberry Fields". Umaine.edu. 1914-06-30. Retrieved 2013-08-04.
  19. "Two-Year Wild Blueberry Production Cycle - Cooperative Extension: Maine Wild Blueberries - University of Maine Cooperative Extension". Cooperative Extension: Maine Wild Blueberries. Retrieved 2022-11-30.
  20. Bushmann, Sara L.; Drummond, Francis A. (August 2015). "Abundance and Diversity of Wild Bees (Hymenoptera: Apoidea) Found in Lowbush Blueberry Growing Regions of Downeast Maine". Environmental Entomology. 44 (4): 975–989. doi:10.1093/ee/nvv082. ISSN   1938-2936. PMID   26314043. S2CID   23922592.
  21. "State Berry - Wild Blueberry | Maine Secretary of State Kids' Page". www.maine.gov. Retrieved 2022-10-08.
  22. Heritage, Canadian (2017-08-15). "Nova Scotia". www.canada.ca. Retrieved 2022-10-08.
  23. Orkin, David (2017-03-05). Nova Scotia. Bradt Travel Guides. p. 289. ISBN   9781784770402.
  24. "State Dessert - Blueberry Pie | Maine Secretary of State Kids' Page". www.maine.gov. Retrieved 2022-12-01.