Allegheny Serviceberry

Handsome small tree usually with several trunks with handsome gray, smooth bark, clean and neat habit, delicious purple fruit looking blu...Read Moreeberry-like in June good for birds and humankind, usually good yellow to orange to red fall color. The leaves tend to be a little smaller than the very similar Downy Serviceberry, are hairless, and are purplish when emerging in spring. A number of cultivars are offered in the trade; some are listed here in Dave's Garden. Native nurseries often sell the straight species, and I bought one straight species for my backyard to cross pollinate with my two Apple Serviceberry trees in the backyard. Serviceberries often don't really need another variety to cross pollinate, as they bear good fruit anyway (apomixis), like a number of the similar Chokeberry
(Aronia) shrubs. After a long, cool, wet spring, serviceberries can suffer some from Cedar Rust disease.

Great tree for a small garden - handles some shade and native in NJ! Bark is pretty, smooth and grey in winter...beautiful white flowers...Read More in spring and great orangey-yellow color in fall!

We have quite a few of these shrubs that were living on our property (a meadow) before we built our house. These fine old bushes serve a...Read Mores shelter for many of the birds here and have nice mid-green foliage in spring and summer and are quite pretty in fall.

We have a clump that we prune back quite a bit in late winter as it tends to get leggy, this helps keep it shapely. Several of the bushes on the back of the property died out in 2004 - possibly it was either their time, or the wet seasons of 2003-2004 did them in. They were in an area coming out of the woods that holds quite a bit of ground water and it is quite marshy up there, especially now, after the rains of 2004.

Don't be afraid to prune this shrub hard, it bounces back within a season and looks much better for it!