Well, this is hilarious.
I brought a John’s and an Adam’s elderberry and I just found out we already had an elderberry growing wild.
Sambucus Cerulea, to be exact.
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It gets the blue dusty berries? Have you made anything with them?
I will take pictures of the berries when they show up. It’s not close to us on our property and I’ve noticed it before, and it looked like it was totally dead, but Now I know it was dormant.
Now that it’s green and flowering, we were able to identify it.
I have not had or used berries from it yet.
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Is that a German Shepherd prowling around behind your elderberry bush?
Mine likes to stroll into my plants-and-trees photos whenever possible.
Above is a Marge elderberry (Sambucus nigra). The flowers on your Sambucus cerulea are much prettier.
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Way cool to find a big established plant on your land.
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I prefer the flavor of blue elderberry over that of both European and American black elderberries. They seem to have more acidity in the fruit. Unfortunately the blues are also much more picky about where they will grow, so I hope folks who find them on their land will appreciate them like you do.
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What are the requirements for the blue variety?
My husband said he found two more of the blue elders, while he was out there cutting low branches off the pines/firs/cedars. Trying to work on defensible space from wildfires.
We have been all over the property and not seen what these were until now - but this last winter was milder and we ended up getting a stream running through our property, which was a first-time surprise for us, in the 4 years we have lived there. Maybe these things contributed to the vigorous emergence of the elders.
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Nice looking GSD!
Yes, we have a brother/sister team of half Belgium Malinois and half GS - male has the GS coloring and his sister has the Belgium Malinois coloring.
We feel VERY grateful to have them and my husband found two more growing.
They have looked dead for a while, so we couldn’t identify them, but I guess the roots were just on standby.
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I put one in. It got big fast. It’s turned into a small tree. It ripens the fruit later in the summer. I do have to water it some to keep it going all summer.
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How well do the blues grow from seeds or cuttings? I saw seeds for these and the reds for sale and was interested in both.
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Cuttings are pretty much a no go. Seeds are good. Just sew after harvest and then after overwintering they will start sprouting the following spring.
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How long do you think they would need for stratification in the fridge? Overwintering isn’t really a thing here, temps are not cold long enough. American Elderberries don’t even go dormant, I thought they were evergreens until I joined this forum.
I imagine that would depend on the provenance of the seeds. They grow wild as far north as Canada, but also south into Mexico. Given that you’re in Florida, I’d try to source seeds from as far south as possible.
Honestly, I’m totally new to elderberries but my husband just read that they do go dormant.
And I haven’t seen the berries yet, but Seek identified the plant.
Hopefully, we’ll get to see berries and take pictures of them to show what color they are.
If they turn out to be a variety that you want I wouldn’t mind sending you seeds, but I need instructions on how to preserve the seeds.
My husband was going to try to clone some blueberries. Maybe he could try an elderberry cutting and see what happens, just for the heck of it.
It sounds like it would be a waste of time, but it’s not like we have to buy the cuttings and he’d be mixing hormones for blueberries anyway.
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I didn’t even know there were red elderberries.