Most wintry berries are bright red.

Seed of most vegetation here finishes developing by late autumn to be ready for winter. It wants to germinate while soil is damp, and before it gets dry after spring. Some needs to vernalize with a bit of chill to be ready to germinate prior to spring. Some offers incentive to birds or other wildlife to disperse it. It develops within colorful fruits and wintry berries.

Both migrating and overwintering birds enjoy wintry berries while other food gets scarce. Squirrels and other wildlife are likely to indulge as well. Seed within such fruit is resilient to digestion. In fact, many of such seed germinate better after digestion softens their hard exteriors. For them, digestion by their vectors is comparable to vernalization by weather.

This is why wintry berries are so colorful. They want to be visually appealing to birds and other vectors who disperse their seed. Their vectors need no more persuasion than that. They instinctively recognize a free meal when they see it. While they eat well, vegetation which feeds them benefits from dispersion of its seed. It is a mutually beneficial situation.

Birds and wildlife are not exclusive beneficiaries of ripe wintry berries. Many people who enjoy gardening appreciate their vibrant color. Such color is particularly appealing where floral color is deficient during winter. Many who enjoy gardening instead prefer any birds who eat such berries. Unfortunately, wintry berries will not last long after birds find them.

Wintry berries are already developing color, a month or so before the beginning of winter. Some may become more prominent as autumn foliar color eventually diminishes. Almost all wintry berries are bright red, but some are rusty red, orange or even golden. Greenish pittosporum berries are not so prominent. Elderberries are uncommon in home gardens.

Firethorn is the most prominent of wintry berries here. Various cotoneasters are likely the second most prominent, with rustier red color. Toyon berries are more colorful than those of cotoneaster, but are less common. English hawthorn can retain its berries longer than its deciduous foliage, but is rare. Because they lack pollination, most hollies are fruitless.

7 thoughts on “Wintry Berries Are Already Colorful”

    1. Hollies are not as popular here as they are in the East, and none are native. Only English holly is naturalized, and although it does not produce many berries, it produces more than cultivated cultivars because both genders grow wild. Almost all cultivated cultivars are female, so do not produce berries without male pollinators.

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      1. Interestingly, I found the difference between male and female blossoms one year–and there are both around here. The birds do love the berries and sometimes a flock comes and feasts before a snowstorm. Holly wood is also fabulous wood to carve with–basically white.

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      2. Are they native species that grow wild, or were they nursery stock, with separate male and female cultivars? Date palms still grow in orchards down south, but no one seems to notice the difference between male and female genders. Ironically, the genders are separated when the trees get recycled into landscapes. (The orchards are displaced by urban development.) More than ninety percent of the trees are females, which are prettier and more desirable for landscapes. Without male pollinators, they are not messy with fruit. However, the taller and lankier males do not get disposed of. They get recycled into remote highway interchanges, where they do not pollinate females.

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      3. My guess with these is that they are ilex opaca, or American holly–they are the right shape and trees rather than shrubs/bushes. Most have berries, but a few don’t. The trees may have been planted in the 70’s or growing undisturbed since the 30’s. Given size, I’d say the 70’s are more likely.

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      4. That is a considerable range. Is that because the site was developed in the 1970s? Someone sent me my first six American holly seedlings from Virginia last year. I am very pleased with them, and even more pleased that they are seedlings rather than modern cultivars. I want to grow what most people there are familiar with.

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      5. The site was developed in the 30’s and remodeled in the 70’s, so that’s why the range. It was re-landscaped, but leaving established trees. There are some specimen tree sweet gum, willow oak, and lacebark elm. Holly are much slower growing than any of those, but I suspect the ones we have are in their fifties.

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