There are several kinds of Sericotheca, much like Spiraea, except the
fruits.
[Sidenote: =Ocean Spray=
_Sericothèca discolor (Spiraea) (Holodiscus)_
=White
Summer
Northwest and Southwest=]
A handsome conspicuous shrub, from three to eight feet high, without
stipules, with roughish, dull-green leaves, toothed or lobed, but not
with leaflets, and pale and woolly on the under side. The tiny flowers
form beautiful, plumy, branching clusters, eight inches or more in
length and almost as much across, cream-white and fuzzy, drooping and
turning brownish as the flowers fade. This is common in the mountains.
There are numerous kinds of Rubus, in temperate regions, with white,
pink, or purple flowers, and red, black, or yellowish "berries." The
fruit is not really a berry, but a collection of many, tiny, round
stone-fruits, crowded on a pulpy, conical receptacle. That of the
Raspberry has a "bloom," and falls off the receptacle when ripe,
but the Blackberry has shining, black fruit, which clings to the
receptacle. Rubus, meaning "red," is the ancient Latin name for the
bramble. Raspberries were cultivated by the Romans in the fourth
century.
[Sidenote: =Salmon-berry=
_Rùbus spectàbilis_
=Red
Summer
Northwest=]
A handsome bush, not at all trailing, from three to nine feet high,
with dark-brown, prickly stems, fine foliage and flowers, and
conspicuously beautiful fruit. The leaves are nearly smooth, with three
leaflets, and the flowers, about two inches across, are a brilliant
shade of deep pink, not purplish in tone, with yellow centers, and
grow singly, or two or three together. The fruit is a firm, smooth
raspberry, over an inch long, bright orange-color, more or less tinted
with red, with a rather pleasant but insipid taste and not very sweet.
This grows in woods. It is rather confusing that this should be called
Salmon-berry in the West, for in the East that is the common name of
_Rubus parviflorus_.
[Sidenote: =Common Blackberry=
_Rùbus vitifòlius_
=White
Spring, summer
California, etc.=]
An evergreen bush, a few feet high and more or less erect; or the
prickly stems trailing on the ground, or climbing over other shrubs,
and sometimes eighteen feet long. The leaves are downy, or almost
smooth, usually rather coarse in texture, and all but a few of the
upper ones have from three to seven leaflets. The flowers are about
an inch across and the petals vary a good deal, being sometimes broad
and sometimes rather long and narrow. This is common from southern
California to British Columbia.
[Illustration: Salmon-berry--R. spectabilis.