Plant Data Sheet

Cloudberry - Rubus chamaemorus

 Picture from:

http://www.borealforest.org/shrubs/shrub39.htm

Range

Circumboreal species, from Alaska, across Canada and in Greenland.

Climate, elevation

Lower elevations, bogs.

Local occurrence (where, how common)

Common in sphagnum bogs.

Habitat preferences

Clouberry grows in a wide variety of sites from wet to dry but dominates or co-dominates in peat bogs.

Plant strategy type/successional stage

Faculative Seral Species
 
“Cloudberry is shade tolerant. In the bog flats of southwestern Alaska, it was one of the first species to come in after dense sphagnum cover was established. Cloudberry is an important component in the understory of mid- to late-seral northern woodlands.” (FEIS database) Fire is also common in the shrub-tussock tundra, Clouberry resprouts after fire from rhizomes.
 

Associated species

Picea mariana/ sphagnum bog, Betula Nana, Betula glandulosa, Ledum goenlandicum, Calidonia spp.,

May be collected as: (seed, layered, divisions, etc.)

Cloudberry reproduces primarily by rhizomes.

Collection restrictions or guidelines

Recommended to not collect rhizomes since bogs are fragile, berries only.

Seed germination (needs dormancy breaking?)

 No information

Seed life (can be stored, short shelf-life, long shelf-life)

 No information

Recommended seed storage conditions

Remove flesh, store in cool dry place.

Propagation recommendations (plant seeds, vegetative parts, cuttings, etc.)

Most successful proagation will be from one wild-collected plant, produce rhizomitously. Can be propagated by seed.

Soil or medium requirements (inoculum necessary?)

Will grow best in Sphagnum.

Installation form (form, potential for successful outcomes, cost)

 No information

Recommended planting density

No information

Care requirements after installed (water weekly, water once etc.)

Saturated soil, sphagnum wetbed perhaps.

Normal rate of growth or spread; lifespan

Sources cited

Hitchcock, C. Leo; Cronquist, Arthur. Flora of the Pacific Northwest: An Illustrated Manual. University of Washington Press. 1987.

MacKinnon, Andy; Pojar, Jim. Plants of the Pacific Northwest Coast:Washington, Oregon, British Columbia and Alaska. Lone Pine Publishing. 1994.

FEIS database: http://www.fs.fed.us/database/feis/plants/shrub/rubcha/

Data compiled by (student name and date)

Christer Lundstrom- June 10, 2003