Erect deciduous shrubs; corolla cylindric or urn-shaped,
white, pink or greenish. =Vaccinium.=
Low evergreen shrub; corolla open-campanulate, pink;
berry red. =Vitis-Idæa.=
Trailing or creeping evergreen shrubs.
Corolla short-campanulate, white; berry white. =Chiogenes.=
Corolla with spreading curved petals, pink; berry red.
=Oxycoccus.=
[Illustration: Menziesia ferruginea Smith. (½ Nat.) Menziesia.]
[Illustration: Kalmia microphylla (Hook.) Heller. (⅔ Nat.) Dwarf
[Sidenote: =Vaccinium cæspitosum= Michx. _Dwarf Bilberry._]
A shrub 3—7 inches high, much branched and nearly smooth throughout.
Leaves obovate or oblong, cuneate, obtuse or acute, green and shining
on both sides, nearly sessile, serrulate, with close bluntish teeth.
Flowers white or pink, small bell-shaped, ⅛ of an inch long, mostly
solitary in the axils and longer than their drooping pedicels; berry ¼
of an inch or more in diameter, blue with a bloom.
On slopes and in alpine meadows throughout the Rockies at the higher
altitudes; flowers appearing with the leaves in early June.
[Sidenote: =Vaccinium erythrococcum= Rydb. _Alpine Bilberry._]
Stems erect with numerous slender, strict, green branches and
branchlets, 3—18 inches high. Leaves ovate or oval, ½ an inch long or
less, bright green. Flowers ovate, ⅛ of an inch long, white or pink,
5-lobed, solitary in the axils of the leaves; berries small, bright red.
On slopes and in alpine meadows throughout the Rockies at the higher
altitudes; flowering during June.
[Sidenote: =Vaccinium ovalifolium= Smith. _Blueberry._]
A straggling branched shrub, 3—12 feet high, the branches slender,
twigs smooth, joints sharply angled. Leaves oval, short-petioled,
smooth on both sides, green above, pale and glaucous beneath, rounded
at both ends or somewhat narrowed at the base, thin, sometimes spine
tipped, entire or nearly so, 1—2 inches long. Flowers commonly solitary
in the axils on rather recurved pedicels; corolla pink or white, ovoid,
¼ of an inch or more long; berries blue with a bloom ½ an inch in
diameter.
In the beds of snow slides, occasionally in the Rockies, and abundant
through the Selkirks, where it is also found in the woods; flowering in
May.
[Illustration: Vaccinium erythrococcum Rydb. (⅔ Nat.) Alpine Bilberry.]
[Illustration: Vaccinium ovalifolium Smith. Blueberry. (½ Nat.)