Flowering Raspberry Offers Summer Bloom

Virtues: Flowering raspberry (Rubus odoratus) is prized for its pretty summer flowers and bold fall foliage colors. Its berries are edible but best left for the songbirds that they attract. This eastern native shrub feeds bumblebees and honeybees too.

Common name: Flowering raspberry

Botanical name:Rubus odoratus

Exposure: Full sun to part shade

Season: Summer for flowers and fruit, fall for foliage

Flowers/fruit: Pink-purple blossoms open throughout the summer and develop into pretty red raspberries. Although edible, these are not as appealing as raspberries bred for their fruit.

Foliage: Maplelike leaves are green throughout summer and then turn vivid shades of red and purple in the fall.

Habit: Flowering raspberry is a coarse shrub made up of many thorn-free canes (stems) that rise from the ground. The shrub can spread by putting up new canes, therefore it works best at the edge of a garden or in a natural-esque area. Flowering raspberry typically grows 3 to 6 feet tall and twice as wide.

Origins: Woodland edges of the eastern half of North America, from Nova Scotia down to the Upper South of the United States.

How to grow flowering raspberry: Site in full sun to part shade, in average soil with good drainage. Cut down old canes after they have fruited. USDA Zones 3–8.

Image credits: Top, Lidara/iStock/Getty Images; Bottom, Anatoliy Berislavskiy/iStock/Getty Images