Plant · P-451

American Gooseberry

Ribes hirtellum

American gooseberry is a low, multistemmed shrub native from Labrador and Manitoba south to Maryland and Iowa, and the wild parent behind most mildew-resistant gooseberry cultivars grown today. Its smooth-skinned berries get eaten raw or cooked into jams, jellies, pies and preserves, or dried for storage, and a healthy mature bush can produce eight to ten pounds a season. What actually limits where it fruits isn't cold hardiness but winter chill - it needs a solid stretch of cold to break bud, and a mild winter can leave a perfectly healthy plant fruitless. Summer heat is a second constraint, since it grows best as an understory shrub shaded through the hottest part of the day.