A pleasant surprise awaited me today when I got home. I took Penny out for a lap around my woods when this caught my eye.
Partridge berry (Mitchella repens) bloom
I was not expecting the partridge berries to be in bloom yet, because a lot of them are still carrying last year’s berries. But here they were. I haven’t looked up the data yet – maybe they’re right on time and I just wasn’t ready.
Most of them have not opened yet. Here’s what they look like just before they open:
Mitchella repens
And here’s one with last year’s fruit:
Last year’s berry
These berries are edible, and I like them quite a bit. I think I could eat a quart of them in one sitting, as they are not overpoweringly sweet like a lot of berries. The two eyes on the berry are from the two flowers you can see in the previous shots. The two flowers fuse at the base and form a single berry, and these eyes are the vestiges the flowers leave behind. That makes them pretty easy to identify too.
I’m also going to include this shot of a maple-leaf viburnum (Viburnum acerifolium) because it had a photogenic visitor:
Mapleleaf viburnum visitor
I have not tried to identify this creature yet, and I think I might not bother. It’s enough just to have his (or her) photo.
Jomegat's Weblog 
June 19, 2014 at 10:18 pm
That’s quite a plant, with beautiful blossoms and good tasting berries! Wish we had them here!
June 20, 2014 at 6:35 am
These flowers don’t last long, but I guess the berries make up for it, providing a food source that is available year-round if you’re willing to dig through the snow for them. They’re just not very copious. It would take two hours to pick a quart, and that’s without snow cover.
June 19, 2014 at 10:39 pm
The bloom is really beautiful and the berry is special…Isn’t it amazing to do that daily trip through the garden, your favorite path through the park, or portion of the forest and look for the changes. It is hard to explain how amazing that is to someone who doesn’t seem to be participating in the world.
June 20, 2014 at 6:38 am
It is pretty amazing. That lap through the woods is only about 5-600 feet, covering the back acre of our property. But small as it is, it’s still a nice place to escape to.
June 20, 2014 at 6:22 am
I’ve seen a lot of berries here too but no flowers yet. I’m wondering why the turkeys aren’t finishing off last year’s berries. They love them.
June 20, 2014 at 6:41 am
I was not expecting them this early, and had it in my head that they would bloom in July. I see turkeys a few miles from here on a regular basis, but I don’t think I’ve ever seen any near our place. I have seen grouse though, and I assume they would not turn their beaks away from partridge berries. They are practically partridges!
June 22, 2014 at 8:27 pm
Now THAT is a red berry!
June 22, 2014 at 8:59 pm
Yes it is. A bunch more of them have bloomed now, and there is one patch with plenty of blossoms and last year’s berries hanging out together. Maybe tomorrow I’ll get a shot of that, but we’ll see.