Amelanchier

I am somewhat new to planting trees. Honestly, unless you live on a large acreage or move around a lot or work in the gardening industry, how many trees do you get to plant in a lifetime? When we bought our home here in Colorado seven years ago, the property had four trees: a dying 70 year-old Sugar Maple, a Sandcherry, a 70 year-old Cottonwood, and an Ash that had been so poorly pruned it was going to split in two any moment. The Sugar Maple came down a few years later, the Ash two years after that. So we were down to two trees. 

Planting trees here in Colorado is tricky. The trickiest part: water. Colorado is arid with irregular moisture cycles that have become more extreme with the acceleration of climate change. When our 70 year-old Sugar Maple was planted in the late 1950's, rain was more plentiful, and a thirsty tree that was smaller could survive. But as the tree matured and moisture levels fell over time, the tree succumbed to disease – as have six other Sugar Maples on our block alone. In fact, in the period of 1951-2000 – a significant chunk of those maple trees' lives – the average annual precipitation decreased by 20%, so while rainfall when they were young trees was enough to sustain a Sugar Maple here on the prairie, it is not sufficient for a mature tree (Colorado State University, "Temperature and Precipitation," Climate Change at CSU, https://climatechange.colostate.edu/chapters/2_temp_precip.html). 

So, as I planned the Wildlife Garden, I wanted to include trees – but they needed to be trees that make sense in our changing climate – smaller, native to our area, and resistant to drought (though all trees in Colorado need to be watered now). Planting a tree is a long-term commitment – to the tree, to the local wildlife, and to your garden's ecosystem. I did a lot of research, and I landed on Amelanchier alinfolia as a great candidate. Two years later I am smitten with Amelanchier of all kinds! 

I planted two groupings that consist of two Amelanchier and one Prunus relatively close together with piles of cut wood from the felled Ash tree nearby.

Amelanchier, which has a range of common names including Shadbush and Serviceberry, is a genus of large shrubs or small trees native to North America. Generally, they can grow as a multi-stemmed shrub which keeps them a bit shorter or as a tree with a single trunk which tend to be taller overall. There are somewhere between 20-80 species/varieties of Amelanchier, but that number is hard to pin down, as the National Park Service notes: "The primary reason there is so much disagreement and confusion about the number of Amelanchier species out there is because of their tendency to cross-pollinate and hybridize with each other. Assemblages of species that do this are sometimes referred to as a 'hybrid swarm.' Some evolutionary biologists believe this is the early stages of the evolution of a new species when populations are just beginning to become genetically different from each other" (NETN Species Spotlight - Serviceberry).

Varieties of Amelanchier span most of North America, and they are a tremendous food source for birds – one of the biggest reasons I chose them. By all accounts, their berries are delicious, but many people leave them to the birds who feast on them in mid to late summer. 

In her beautiful book, The Serviceberry, Robin Wall Kimmerer recounts the Native Americans' relationship to the Amelanchier, writing, "Calendar plants like Serviceberry are important for synchronizing the seasonal rounds of traditional Indigenous People, who move in an annual cycle through their homelands to where the foods are ready. Instead of changing the land to suit their convenience, they changed themselves" (p. 3-4). The feast that appears on the Amelanchier's boughs is feast for all creatures – and spreads seed widely, too. 

My Amelanchier trees — plus two Prunus virginiana 'Canada Red' (Canada Red Chokecherry)