COMMON SNOWBERRY

Symphoricarpos albus
family: Honeysuckle (Caprifoliaceae)
méhmemenó'ėstse, "spicy-berry bushes" (Hart 1981: 17)
méhnó'ėstse, "water-monster plants" (Fisher et al. 2012)
 
Common snowberry is densely branched shrub, 1 to 2 m tall. The annual shoots are green, later grey-green, hairy. The bark of branches flakes in narrow stripes. Leaves are opposite, with entire margin, hairless, above dark green, underneath blue-green. Inflorescence is a cluster containing tiny, bell-shaped, pinkish-white flowers. Common snowberry blossoms from June to August. Fruit is white, round berry, about 1 cm in diameter. It ripens from August to December. This plant is modest. It grows on stony soils and along streams. It ranges from Québec to British Columbia; south up to Pennsylvania, Kentucky, Minnesota, South Dakota, Montana, and California. Common snowberry was introduced to Europe and occurs commonly in parks and gardens as a green fence in the Czech Republic. It runs wild there.
 

WESTERN SNOWBERRY

Symphoricarpos occidentalis
family: Honeysuckle (Caprifoliaceae)
méhmemenó'ėstse, "spicy-berry bushes" (Hart 1981: 17)
méhnó'ėstse, "water-monster plants" (Fisher et al. 2012)
 
Western snowberry is erect shrub 1 to 1,5 m tall, later with slightly overhanging branches. The annual shoots are hairy, yellow-brown, later red-brown. Leaves are ovate or oval to elongated, 2 to 7 cm long, stiff to mid-skinny; above hairless, rich green to grey-green; underneath grey-green, sparsely hairy. Flowers are light pink, infundibular, 6 mm wide, inside densely hairy. They form dense axillary or top clusters. Western snowberry blossoms from June to July. Fruits are greenish-white, round, about 1 cm wide. They ripen from August to October. This plant grows on dry, stony slopes. It ranges in the Rocky Mountains and on the Great Plains; south up to the northern New Mexico and the southwest and central Kansas; east up to headwaters of Mississippi; north up to Canada; west up to Washington and British Columbia. It is often a part of green fences in the Czech Republic.
 
Cheyennes used snowberry branches for the Sun Dance altar (Grinnell 1923 II: 259). Their position on the altar of this ceremony could have connection with the fact that the snowberry balls look like hailstones, an important symbol of the Cheyenne religion, strongly connected with the Sun Dance Ceremony (hestȯsanestȯtse or hoxéhevȯhomó'hestȯtse). The snowberry balls, which are green at first and turn white later, demonstrate perfectly the sacred green-white change and maybe have connection with the "green hail" and "white hail" paint of the Sun Dancers (Moore 1996: 224–6). Some Cheyennes believe that snowberry looks like western poison ivy (Toxicodendron rydbergii) and causes itching (Hart 1981: 17).
 
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