CHAPTER XXI 



BOTANY OF HEATH-FRUITS 



The heath family (Ericaceae) furnishes a 

 domesticated plant without its like for certain 

 soils and without equal for certain purposes. 

 This unique plant is the cranberry. Several 

 other heath plants are favorite wild fruits in 

 all quarters of the globe. These are variously 

 called blueberries, bilberries, huckleberries, 

 whortleberries, whinberries, blaeberries, moor- 

 berries, deerberries, farkleberries, cowberries, 

 foxberries, and dangleberries. These plants 

 belong to as many species as there are com- 

 mon names, or more, as some of the common 

 names are applied to more than one species. 

 All, including the cranberry, are members of 

 two genera in the heath family, Vaccinium and 

 Gaylussacia, both of which are composed of 

 woody plants presenting all gradations from 

 slender, delicate, trailing vines to sturdy 

 shrubs. Both genera are of social habit, most 

 of the species, wherever found, covering ex- 

 tensive tracts; both prefer the humus of peat- 

 bogs, swamps, woods, or heath. Vaccinium is 

 much the more important of the two species. 



Vaccinium. Erect or trailing woody plants. Leaves 

 evergreen or deciduous, alternate, leathery or succulent. 

 Flowers axillary or terminal, solitary, clustered or 

 racemed ; white or reddish ; corolla variously shaped, 

 4-5 cleft ; sepals 4-5 or obsolete ; stamen 8 or 10 ; 

 anthers opening by a hole at the apex. Fruit a berry, 

 4-5-celled, many seeded, sometimes 8-10-celled by a 

 fake partition from the back of the. cell to the placenta; 

 capped by the persistent calyx. 



The genus is represented by more than a 

 hundred species, which encircle the globe in 

 the North Temperate Zone, a few being found 

 in the South Temperate Zone. In the northern 

 hemisphere, species are found from the moun- 

 tains of the tropics to well within the Arctic 

 Circle. Vacciniums are most common in tem- 

 perate North America and the mountains of 

 central and southern Asia. 



There is much confusion in the common 

 names of species of Vaccinium. While the 

 common names found in the botanies, as 

 given on this page may be used or have been 

 used by English-speaking people somewhere or 

 sometime, they are now seldom heard in 

 America. Heath-fruits pass under three com- 

 mon names in North America cranberries, 

 blueberries, and huckleberries. Red-fruited 

 species of Vaccinium are almost universally 

 called cranberries, with such qualifying ad- 

 jectives as large, small, low-bush, or high-bush. 

 It is not so easy to define the use of blueberry 

 and huckleberry. In most parts of the United 

 States, the two names are used without dis- 

 tinction, but in the North Atlantic and New 

 England states blueberries are fruits of the 



genus Vaccinium in which the seeds are nu- 

 merous but so small as not to be noticed in 

 eating, while huckleberries are fruits of the 

 genus Gaylussacia, the berries of which contain 

 ten large, hard seeds. In some of the central 

 states, huckleberries are the produce of the 

 high-bush, dark-fruited Vacciniums, while the 

 berries of low-growing species are called blue- 

 berries. The New England usage of blueberry 

 for species of Vaccinium and huckleberry for 

 the Gaylussacias is best, and the names will 

 be so used in this text. 



THE FORM AND STRUCTURE OF HEATH-FRUITS 



Cranberries and blueberries are the least 

 known of pomological plants. They belong to 

 a botanical family which has marked peculi- 

 arities in structure of plant, in habits of growth, 

 and in choice of environment; moreover, they 

 have been under cultivation so short a time, and 

 their culture is restricted to so few regions, 

 that fruit-growers have not had opportunities 

 to become acquainted with them. It is espe- 

 cially necessary, therefore, that those who 

 grow these fruits should know the gross struc- 

 ture and habits of growth in order properly to 

 propagate, transplant, prune, and otherwise 

 care for them, as well as to identify species 

 and varieties. Fortunately the botany of 

 heath-fruits is easily learned. The structures 

 of fruit and plant, and the habits of growth are 

 distinctive, and, since there are no closely re- 

 lated fruits for which cranberries and huckle< 

 berries can possibly be mistaken, all characters 

 of heath-fruits are readily impressed on the 

 mind. 



The plant. 



As with other fruits, all of the organs and 

 characters of the plant must be portrayed in 

 descriptions of these fruits. Size and vigor of 

 plant usually receive first attention, care being 

 taken not to confuse vigor with size, since 

 small plants may be quite as vigorous may 

 have just as much internal push as large 

 plants. The different species and varieties of 

 heath-fruits show quite as many peculiarities 

 of growth as other cultivated fruits, all of 

 which must be characterized. The thickness, 

 color, direction of growth, and length of in- 

 ternodes of the woody parts must all be 

 noted. The stems of some species of Vaccinium 

 are pubescent; of others glabrous. Some are 

 warty, or speckled, or otherwise peculiarly 

 marked. There are low-bush and high-bush 

 forms of both cranberries and blueberries, so 



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