FREE: Southern Black Haw aka Nanny Berry (10 seeds)

Light: Rusty black-haw grows well in partial shade where it tends to have an open, airy habit. In full sun it grows more dense and bushy. Maximum flowering and fruiting occur in full sun.
Moisture: Rusty black-haw is quite drought tolerant.
Hardiness: USDA Zones 5 - 9.
Propagation: You can expect rusty black-haw to flower every spring, but you may not get fruits if you have only one plant. Like most viburnums, rusty black-haw is self-incompatible, which means that it cannot pollinate itself. To get fruits, you need two different seedling plants - two vegetative clones of the same plant will not suffice. Viburnum seeds are difficult to germinate because they have a required period of dormancy and are enclosed in a hard seed coat or stone. Under the best of conditions, black-haw seeds will take a year to germinate. Clean the stones thoroughly, removing all traces of the fleshy pulp, sow them in potting medium or soil, and leave the pots outside in the weather. Wait. Keep seedlings in the shade for a year or two. Rusty black-haw can be propagated vegetatively from fast growing green-wood cuttings taken in summer. http://www.floridata.com/ref/v/vibu_ruf.cfm

All you need is a little tender, love, and care and plant experience to get them to grow. Now for the good news! The berries taste pretty good and sweet when they are ripe and can be made into the most delicious jelly.
Ingredients

1 quart black haw berries
1 cup sugar per cup of juice
3 ounces pectin

Directions:

Wash and stem berries.

Place berries into a deep saucepan with a little water and bring to a boil. Reduce heat and cook till fruit until the berries pop and juice runs. Remove from heat and run through a food mill or strainer.

Pour pulp juice through a jelly bag but do not squeeze the bag. Measure the juice and place into a deep saucepan. Add sugar and bring to a boil while stirring constantly. When sugar has dissolved add the pectin and boil hard for 1 full minute. Skim off the foam and pour into hot, sterile jelly jars.

BLACK HAW WINE

3 lbs ripe black haw berries
� lb black raisins or zante currants, chopped
2� lbs granulated sugar
7 pts water
1 tsp acid blend
� tsp pectic enzyme
1 tsp yeast nutrient
wine yeast

Bring water to boil and add sugar. Stir until sugar is completely dissolved. Meanwhile, wash fruit and chop raisins or currants. Combine in nylon straining bag, tie closed and put in primary. Mash berries with piece of hardwood. Pour boiling water over bag, cover, and set aside to cool. When primary reaches room temperature, stir in remaining ingredients except yeast. Cover and set aside 12 hours. Add activated yeast. Ferment 10 days, stirring and squeezing bag daily. Remove nylon straining bag and squeeze gently to extract flavor. Discard pulp, transfer liquid to secondary and fit airlock. If required, top up when fermentation subsides. After 30 days, rack, top up and refit airlock. Repeat racking every 30 days until wine clears and no new sediments form over 30-day period. Stabilize, sweeten as desired, wait 10-14 days, and rack into bottles. This wine should be aged 6 months before drinking.

Do you know how well if at all they will grow in the wet northwest?

http://plants.usda.gov/java/profile?symbol=vipr map shows where the tree is found naturally. There are more than 150 species of Viburnum; many are native to North America, growing in USDA Hardiness Zones 2 to 9. I would ask a local nursery if this tree will grow in the Pacific Northwest as they are more qualified to answer that question. I know we get an average of 54 inches of rain here in Tennessee so they might do ok there.

hi there, i'm gail, I am sure angela has fussed about me to you..lol...she always tells me i want it all when she posts on here, she has told me about the adventures that she has had hiking and from your pic you look like the Marie in her white blackberry post pic, if so, get ready, she calls me her stalker, but i love information on fruits, greens and wild things that are edible and good for you. so watching, bidding and fanned you...

Yup, that's me the wild mountain woman who eats weeds, sells weeds, etc. The berries on this tree taste like raisins! I would have picked more but it was so cold my hands got numb. Angela and I have so many adventures I asked her to write a book. She can't write it because she stays on Listia too much.

LOL, yea we were just chatting about that, but that is an awesome idea, betwixt the 2 that book would be a hoot for sure...lol i told her I wanted to buy a book if she does, not bid on it cause on her auctions i usually get outbid, so i just want to downright purchase it...Im sure I would be up all night reading, laughing, and p---- my pants...she is so funny, but i sure do admire her...it is so nice to finally meet her hiking partner. you 2 take care of each other on those hikes and don't let the bears get ya! gotta have my wild berries, and other stuff not to mention the stories...:-) God Bless rita

The stories make a good read, but if not in amazon.com book form, doesn't pay the light bill, the telephone bill, internet bill, doctor, bill and worst of all the #%&@)%'ing IRS bill they always want up front. Keep after Cantankerous to do the book.

f&w...if you need 2 trees to get the berries, how do you get them if the seeds are from the same tree? to make the jelly do you have to clean the berries like you said to planting to grow the tree? :-)

The seeds are from several trees growing side by side, but they are all mixed up so don't know which trees the seeds came from. Chances are good that at least one or more of the seeds come from different trees. I can get more seeds in the next week or two as they stay on the limbs a long time like these have. To make the jelly you take the whole berry, cover with water, bring to a boil and simmer until the fruit around the seed is tender. The water will turn color too. All you use is the juice from the berries not the whole berry because the pits are like a cherry pit and very hard. There's some good black haw recipes at http://earthnotes.tripod.com/blkhaw.htm but will post them here separately. Hey, there's enough berries left on the trees to try one that sounds good!

http://earthnotes.tripod.com/blkhaw.htm

Black Haw Conserve

Ingredients
2 oranges
1½ quarts black haw berries
¾ tsp ground cinnamon
3 tbsp lemon juice
3 cups sugar

Slice oranges into very thin sections removing seeds. Cook slices in water till tender. Clean and stem berries. Place into saucepan and crush with a masher (do not use a blender as it will pulverize the seeds). Strain crushed berries through a strainer or food mill to remove the seeds. Add the juicy pulp to the cooked oranges and mix well. Add cinnamon, lemon juice and sugar. Mix thoroughly and simmer over low heat till sauce thickens. Allow to cool for a few mnutes then put into hot, sterile jars and seal.

Black Haw Jam

Ingredients
1 quart of black haw berries
1 cup sugar per cup of juice
½ cup water
3 oz pectin

Wash and stem berries and place into a deep saucpan. Add water and cook till fruit pops. Crush fruit completely with a masher. Run through a food mill or strainer to remove skins and seeds. Measure juicy pulp and place in deep saucepan with sugar. Bring to a boil stirring constantly, then add 3 oz liquid pectin. Boil and stir for 1 full minute then remove from heat and skim of foam. Pour into hot, sterile jelly jars and seal.

Black Haw Jelly

Ingredients
1 quart black haw berries
1 cup sugar per cup of juice
3 oz pectin

Wash and stem berries. Place berries into a deep saucepan with a little water and bring to a boil. Reduce heat and cook till fruit till berries pop and juice runs. Remove from heat and run through a food mill or strainer. Pour pulp juice through a jelly bag but do not squeeze the bag. Measure the juice and place into a deep saucepan. Add sugar and bring to a boil while stirring constantly. When sugar has dissolved add the pectin and boil hard for 1 full minute. Skim off the foam and pour into hot, sterile jelly jars.

Variation: Spicy jelly: Place 1 stick of cinnamon, 1 tbsp of whole cloves, and 1 tsp of ground allspice into a spice bag and place into the saucepan with 1 cup of water and the berries. When the berries have popped and the juice runs freely, remove the spice bag and proceed with recipe.

The best recipe is for the black haw juice, which you'd need to make the jelly anyhow. I'm going to try to pick enough to make the jelly but they are best picked before winter sets in and dries them out. I still like eating the skins off the pits because it tastes so sweet and the flavor of raisins. It is so nice to find wild stuff to eat in the wilds of Tennessee in the dead of winter. Which brings me to the passion vine aka maypops I just found today and going to eat. You can actually live off the land if you have the want-to and know-how, both of which I possess thank goodness!

Black Haw Juice

Add 2 quarts of washed and stemmed black haw berries to a deep saucepan. Cook for 5 to 6 minutes, then crush berries completely with a masher. Add 1 cup of water and simmer for 5 minutes. Remove and run through a strainer or a few layers of cheesecloth. Collect the juice and add 1 cup of lemon juice. Mix thoroughly. Serve chilled or can be frozen.