Jan–MarApr–JunJul–SepOct–Dec
Planting
Days to maturity
Seasonal yields
Sow indoors · Direct sow · Transplant outdoors
← Explore Plants
Plant · P-438
Cranberry
Vaccinium macrocarpon
Cranberry is a low, creeping evergreen groundcover of eastern North American bogs and cool wetlands, grown for its very acid, vitamin-C-rich berries. The fruit is too tart to eat raw for most tastes, so it goes into pies, preserves, sauce and juice, or gets dried for winter. Its trailing stems root as they run, knitting into a dense mat that spreads rapidly once established, and a planting takes about five years to reach full bearing but can then crop for sixty to a hundred years. It needs constantly wet to semi-boggy, strongly acid ground - the commercial crop is grown on a managed bog over a sand base.
Record at a glance
Growing profile
- Sun
- Full Sun
- USDA zone
- USDA 3–7
- Soil
- Sand · Silt · Loam
- Moisture
- Well-Drained · Moist · Wet
Vertical layer
Groundcover- Soil pH
- 4–5.2
- Plant type
- Perennial
- Mature height
- 3–6 in
- Mature spread
- 18–28 in
- Plant spacing
- 24 in
- Root type
- Stolon
- Spread pattern
- Root
Keep exploring
Similar plants
Discover more plants with shared forest layers or growing conditions.
Barren Strawberry
Waldsteinia fragarioides
Barren Strawberry is a low woodland groundcover with strawberry-like leaves and yellow spring flowers, but despite the name and the leaf…
Groundcover · USDA 4–7
Beach Strawberry
Fragaria chiloensis
Beach strawberry is a low, evergreen, mat-forming strawberry native to Pacific coast dunes and bluffs from Alaska south through California to…
Groundcover · USDA 4–10
Bilberry
Vaccinium myrtillus
Bilberry is a low, suckering shrub of acid heaths and cool mountain woodland, spreading by rhizome into a knee-high mat. Its small dark…
Groundcover · USDA 3–7
Black Medick
Medicago lupulina
Black Medick is a low, sprawling nitrogen-fixing clover relative that forms a mowable mat through fall, winter and spring before dying back…
Groundcover · USDA 3–9
Carpet Bugle
Ajuga reptans
Carpet Bugle forms a fast, dense, rooting mat that thrives in dry shade - the hardest niche on most properties to fill, since dry ground…
Groundcover · USDA 3–10
Catmint
Nepeta racemosa
Catmint blooms from spring through the end of summer if the spent flower spikes are sheared after each flush, holding nectar for pollinators…
Groundcover · USDA 5–9
The deeper layer
Plan what comes next.
- Primary
- Locked ecological function
- Secondary
- Locked ecological function
- Byproduct
- Locked ecological function
Behind the record
- Locked research reference
- Locked research reference
- Locked research reference