American Black Currant

Bottom Line Up Front: American Black Currant is a wonderful and thornless shrub for your North American landscaping. It produces small fruit, and if you dont eat them, other animals will enjoy them. Though they were persecuted for harboring a white pine blight, many native varieties are great to include in your native garden.

Scientific Name: Ribes americanum

Characteristics: A distinguishing characteristic seen below is the tiny gold pores on the surface of the leaves. It will also not have spines like many other Ribes genus plants.

Size: 3-5ft wide and tall.

Description: The American blackcurrant is a shorter bush that’s semi shade tolerant And is an early spring bloomer. It’s relatives are the gooseberries and currants that we are commonly associated with wines and jellies. The American black currant produces yellowish green droopy flowers in the spring which are visited by bumblebees. These flowers are then followed by small berries which turn black just as the name says. There are relatives of the American black currant which are thorny but this shrub has no thorns and an interesting mottled colored bark in the winter. It’s a good shrub to include along borders and it has a sparse fountain shape with beautiful Maple shaped leaves that have golden flecks on the top of the leaf. It almost looks as if someone sprinkled glitter on the tops of the leaves and it’s one of my favorite features about the plant, as well as a good way to identify this very diverse genus of plants all the way down to the species that is the American blackcurrant.

If you don’t end up eating the berries or putting them in a jam birds will come and feast on them as well as many larva of clear wing and Hummingbird moths as well as the brown elfin butterfly. The American blackcurrant does not have enough stems to really provide much cover for wildlife, but that can be an advantage when you want to include some sedges or other types of ground cover underneath this shrub as they will play nice and not shade each other out. Native Americans made AT from the root for kidney troubles and to handle intestinal worms. Though there are not a whole lot of medicinal uses for the plant as most people prefer the berries.

Below we see another cool part about growing American Black Currant: its ability to be propagated from cuttings. In the images you can see that I simply cut 6-10inch sections of Ribes americanum and stuck them in potting soil. If kept moist for several weeks, they will sprout roots and make several new plants to harden off and place in your wildlife garden.