Ribes Species, Blood Currant, Flowering Currant, Redflower Currant, Winter Currant

Grown for its showy flowers in tulip season, white through light pink to magenta. The bluish fruit is edible but insipid and best used to...Read More feed the birds, who wait till nothing tastier is available.

Grown as a upright suckering shrub it reaches 5-8' tall and 2/3 as wide. It can be pruned as a tree form, and can (rarely) reach 12', but is generally more attractive as a shrub.

Generally considered hardy only to Z6.

Native to western coastal N. America from mid-BC to mid-California. This species is an alternative host to white pine blister rust, a devastating disease of the commercially important white pine. Some eastern states prohibit its planting. Spores travel by wind and can infect pines 300 miles away.

I ordered a bunch of these bareroot from the King Country Conservation plant sale. They all thrived in dry part shade. They took 3 years ...Read Moreto bloom, but then were spectacular. Good hummingbird plant. Fast growing.

When you see the first flowers on this plant....watch for the Hummingbirds returning to the Pacific North West from their vacations down ...Read Moresouth. Native to Southern British Columbia and south.

"Native to Dry open woods, rocky slopes, disturbed sites at low to middle elevations. The berries are edible but insipid. They were eaten by various Coast Salish gruops such as the Saanich, Cowichan, Squamish, and Sechelt, but they were not highly regarded. They were eaten fresh but not usually collectred for drying." - Plants of Coastal British Columbia including Washington, Oregon & Alaska by Pojar and Mackinnon.

bears pendulous, red flower clusters on a 6-8 foot shrub in spring, followed by blue to black berries in fall that are unpalatable to hum...Read Moreans. Some think this shrub is the most striking of the flowering currants and consider it the best ornamental of the Ribes genus. The leaves are maple-like and turn yellow in autumn. This shrub prefers dry to moist, well-drained sites in full sun to partial shade. It would be an excellent choice as a landscape plant, soil stabilizer, natural hedge, or in the outer row of multi-row windbreaks.

Wildlife benefit: Provides cover for upland game birds and small mammals. Fruit is eaten by a variety of songbirds and small mammals.

Seed can be sown by birds (eating the berries) so you can end up with a lot of them! Gives great colour in late winter when there's no a lot else flowering.