Bumblebees are the flower's chief
benefactors. Game fowl, especially grouse, but many other birds
too, and various animals which are glad to add the clusters of
smooth red bearberries to their scanty winter menu, however
insipid and dry they may be, have distributed the seed from
Labrador across Arctic America to Alaska, southward to
Pennsylvania, Illinois, Nebraska, and California. How plants do
compel insects, birds, and beasts to work for them! The entire
plant is astringent, and has been used in medicine; also by
leather dressers.
BLACK or HIGH-BUSH HUCKLEBERRY; WHORTLEBERRY [now TALL
HUCKLEBERRY]
(Gaylussacia resinosa) Huckleberry family
Flowers - White and pink, pale or deep, small, cylindric,
bell-shaped. 5-parted, borne in 1-sided racemes from the sides of
the stiff, grayish branches. Stem: A shrub to 3 ft. high. Leaves:
Alternate, oval to oblong, firm, entire edged, green on both
sides, dotted underneath with resinous spots, especially when
young. Fruit: A round, black, bloomless, sweet, berry-like drupe,
containing 10 seed-like nutlets, in each of which is a solitary
seed.
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