SERVICE-BERRY. JUNE-BERRY.
Amelanchier alnifolia, Nutt. Rose Family.
Deciduous shrubs, three to eight feet high. Leaves.—Alternate; petioled; from rounded to oblong-ovate; serrate usually only toward the apex; six to eighteen lines long. Flowers.—White, in short racemes. Calyx-tube.—Campanulate; limb five-parted. Petals.—Five; oblong; six lines or so long. Stamens.—Twenty; short. Ovary.—Three- to five-celled. Styles three to five. Fruit.—Small; berry-like; dark purple. Hab.—Throughout the State and northward; also eastward to the Western States.
[AMERICAN BARRENWORT—Vancouveria parviflora.]
![[AMERICAN BARRENWORT—Vancouveria parviflora.]](#3624944100741987669_f029.png.id-8598519094265748815.wrap-0.html.html){kind=link}
The service-berry seems to be at home throughout our borders, but it reaches its greatest perfection north of us, on the rich bottom-lands of the Columbia River. In spring the bushes are beautiful, when snowily laden with masses of ragged white flowers; and from June to September they are no less welcome, when abundantly hung with the black berries, which usually have a bloom upon them. These berries are an important article of food among our Western Indians, who make annual pilgrimages to the regions of their growth, gathering and drying large quantities for winter use. The drying they effect by crushing them to a paste, which they spread upon bark or stones in the sun. It is said that many a party of explorers, lost in the woods, has been kept alive by this little fruit.
Almost the same shrub in the Atlantic States is called "shad-bush," because it blooms at about the season when the shad are running up the streams.