# Shadblow Serviceberry (Amelanchier canadensis)

> A clump-forming serviceberry of swamps and wet thickets, with upright white flower clusters in early spring and sweet purple-black berries by June.

Also called Canadian serviceberry, Canada serviceberry, eastern shadbush, thicket serviceberry, Amelanchier oblongifolia. Category: Nut & Fruit Trees. Grown from seed by Blue Whale Trees. Web version: https://bluewhaletrees.com/plants/shadblow-serviceberry/

![Shadblow serviceberry (Amelanchier canadensis) erect white flower clusters among half-open young leaves](https://bluewhaletrees.com/img/plants/shadblow-serviceberry-h1610-800.jpg)
*Photo: Richard Webb, CC BY 3.0 · [Wikimedia Commons](https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File%3AAmelanchier_canadensis_1480044.jpg)*

## Facts

- Type: Small tree
- Mature height: 6 to 25 ft
- USDA hardiness zones: 3 to 8
- Grows wild in: The coast, the forest understory, swamps and wet flats
- Native range: 18 states and the District of Columbia, north to Maine, south to Georgia and west to Mississippi (Alabama, Connecticut, Delaware, Georgia, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, Mississippi, New Hampshire, New Jersey, New York, North Carolina, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, South Carolina, Tennessee, Virginia, West Virginia and the District of Columbia)
- Sun: Full, Part
- Soil moisture: Average, Wet
- Growth rate: Medium
- Traits: Edible, Showy flowers, Wildlife value, Tolerates wet soil, Fall color
- Sold as: Saplings, Seed

Heights and zones are typical ranges for the species in cultivation; local conditions and seed source shift them.

## Availability

Not yet priced online. Ask at captain@bluewhaletrees.com or leave an email on the web page to be told when it is listed.

## Notes

Shadblow serviceberry is the serviceberry of Atlantic swamps and bogs, a large shrub or small tree that grows as a clump of upright stems and spreads by suckers into a thicket. Its flower clusters are erect and more compact than those of downy and Allegheny serviceberry. The name has long been confused, and the nursery trade often applies it to downy serviceberry or a hybrid. Set a clump along a pond or a wet property line, where the early bloom, June fruit and red fall leaves all show.

## Size, growth and what to expect

It grows at a medium pace, about a foot and a half a year in our growth estimator. It grows 6 to 25 feet tall and 15 to 20 feet wide. In the wild it can reach about 30 feet. A sapling bears its first fruit 2 to 3 years after planting.

White flowers open from March to May in erect clusters, before the leaves are half unfolded. The berries turn from green to red to purplish black between May and July, sweet and juicy, a quarter to three eighths of an inch across. Orioles, cardinals, thrushes, catbirds, waxwings, robins, squirrels and chipmunks eat them. The leaves turn orange-red in fall.

It grows wild on the Atlantic Coastal Plain and Piedmont from Maine to Georgia, and inland to Tennessee, in swamps, bogs, wet thickets and damp woods. It is abundant in the forested wetlands around Chesapeake Bay. It is one of the earliest trees to flower each spring.

## How to grow Shadblow Serviceberry

Shadblow serviceberry grows in full sun or part shade, and in the South it welcomes afternoon shade. It likes a moist, acid, sandy loam, and it takes wet ground, clay and moderate drought. Set trees 12 feet apart, and keep each one 15 feet from a wall and 15 feet from overhead wires.

Saplings ship bare-root or potted. Plant them dormant, from leaf fall until bud swell, in a hole wider than the roots and no deeper. Set the crown at the soil line, put the native soil back in, and keep the mulch an inch clear of the stems. Clean the seed out of the fruit as soon as it ripens, before the pulp ferments. Sow cleaned seed outdoors in fall a quarter inch deep, under a mulch. For spring, hold it damp in the refrigerator for 90 to 120 days first. Many seeds wait until the second spring to come up.

Water regularly through the first summer, and after that only in droughts. The thin bark scars easily from mowers and string trimmers, so keep a mulch ring around the stems. Deer seldom damage it badly, but a wire guard keeps rabbits off young stems. Prune only to thin crowded stems, and pull suckers unless you want a thicket.

A lone tree can set fruit with its own pollen, but a second tree from different seed raises the crop, so plant two or more. Birds strip the berries as they ripen, so net a branch if you want some. Rust, leaf spot and powdery mildew can mark the leaves, but the damage is mostly cosmetic. Sawflies, leaf miners and borers sometimes feed on it.

## Sources

- [Flora of North America, vol. 9: Amelanchier canadensis, Campbell and others](http://www.efloras.org/florataxon.aspx?flora_id=1&taxon_id=250100021)
- [USDA NRCS Plant Guide: Canadian serviceberry, Amelanchier canadensis, Sheahan 2015](https://plants.usda.gov/DocumentLibrary/plantguide/pdf/pg_amca4.pdf)
- [NC State Extension Gardener Plant Toolbox: Amelanchier canadensis](https://plants.ces.ncsu.edu/plants/amelanchier-canadensis/)
- [Missouri Botanical Garden Plant Finder: Amelanchier canadensis](https://www.missouribotanicalgarden.org/PlantFinder/PlantFinderDetails.aspx?taxonid=286376)
- [Lady Bird Johnson Wildflower Center: Amelanchier canadensis](https://www.wildflower.org/plants/result.php?id_plant=AMCA4)
- [USDA Forest Service, Woody Plant Seed Manual (2008), Amelanchier chapter, Brinkman and Strong](https://www.fs.usda.gov/nsl/Wpsm/Amelanchier.pdf)
- [Trees and Shrubs Online (International Dendrology Society): Amelanchier canadensis, from Bean](https://www.treesandshrubsonline.org/articles/amelanchier/amelanchier-canadensis/)
- [University of Florida IFAS and USDA Forest Service: Fact Sheet ST-74, Amelanchier canadensis, Shadblow Serviceberry, Gilman and Watson, November 1993](http://web.archive.org/web/20240613165154/https://hort.ifas.ufl.edu/database/documents/pdf/tree_fact_sheets/amecana.pdf)
- [University of Wisconsin-Madison Extension, Wisconsin Horticulture: Serviceberry, Amelanchier spp.](https://hort.extension.wisc.edu/articles/serviceberry-amelanchier-spp/)
- [Native Plant Trust, Go Botany: Amelanchier canadensis](https://gobotany.nativeplanttrust.org/species/amelanchier/canadensis/)
- [NatureServe Explorer: Amelanchier canadensis](https://explorer.natureserve.org/Taxon/ELEMENT_GLOBAL.2.960010/Amelanchier_canadensis)
- [Natural Resources Canada, Canada's Plant Hardiness Site: Amelanchier canadensis](https://planthardiness.gc.ca/index.php?m=7&speciesid=3023833&lang=en)

## Read before planting

- [Ten planting mistakes that quietly kill trees](https://bluewhaletrees.com/articles/ten-planting-mistakes/index.html.md)
- [Transplanting young trees: timing, water and protection](https://bluewhaletrees.com/articles/transplanting-young-trees/index.html.md)
- [Protecting young trees from voles, rabbits, deer and squirrels](https://bluewhaletrees.com/articles/protecting-trees-from-animals/index.html.md)
- [Native trees for insects: the beetles, wasps, cicadas and fireflies that everything else eats](https://bluewhaletrees.com/articles/native-trees-for-insects/index.html.md)
- [Native trees and shrubs for butterflies and moths: host plants first, nectar second](https://bluewhaletrees.com/articles/native-trees-for-butterflies-and-moths/index.html.md)
- [Multistem or single stem? Sometimes the trunk is hiding the answer](https://bluewhaletrees.com/articles/multistem-or-single-stem/index.html.md)

## Related

- [Planting-site check](https://bluewhaletrees.com/tools/site-check/index.html.md): for a thrive, struggle or fail verdict on Shadblow Serviceberry, add ?species=shadblow-serviceberry with zone (2 to 10), sun (full, part, shade) and moisture (dry, average, wet) to that address, for example ?species=shadblow-serviceberry&zone=3&sun=part&moisture=average.
- [Companion species for Shadblow Serviceberry](https://bluewhaletrees.com/tools/companions/index.html.md?species=shadblow-serviceberry): the natives that share its ground and the plants that pair with it in a yard.
- [Growth estimator](https://bluewhaletrees.com/tools/growth/index.html.md): how the height and trunk projections are made; the estimate itself runs in the browser at https://bluewhaletrees.com/tools/growth/#species=shadblow-serviceberry
- [Seed sowing planner](https://bluewhaletrees.com/tools/sowing/index.html.md): how Shadblow Serviceberry is sown, in the chart for every species (treatment, cold days, depth, timing); the dated plan runs in the browser at https://bluewhaletrees.com/tools/sowing/#species=shadblow-serviceberry
- [Pollination planner](https://bluewhaletrees.com/tools/pollination/index.html.md): what Shadblow Serviceberry needs for a crop and how many to plant, in the table for every species; the planner runs in the browser at https://bluewhaletrees.com/tools/pollination/#plants=shadblow-serviceberry:2
- [Bloom and fruit calendar](https://bluewhaletrees.com/tools/calendar/index.html.md): the months Shadblow Serviceberry flowers and fruits, in the grid for every species.