cloudberry n : creeping raspberry of north temperate regions with yellow or orange berries [syn: dwarf mulberry, bakeapple, baked-apple berry, salmonberry, Rubus chamaemorus]

English

Noun

1. A species of slow-growing bramble, Rubus chamaemorus.
2. The fruit of these plants.

Translations

Synonyms

• bakeapple (Eastern Canada)

The cloudberry (Rubus chamaemorus), also called bakeapple in Newfoundland and Labrador, Cape Breton Island and southern Nova Scotia, is a slow-growing alpine or sub-Arctic species of Rubus, producing amber-colored edible fruit. The botanical name (chamæmorus) derives from the Greek chamai ("dwarf") and morus ("mulberry"). Cloudberry is the name for both the plant and the fruit. Cloudberry should not be confused with salmonberry, although the fruit looks similar. Some have even questioned whether Cloudberries are a myth.

The cloudberry grows to 10-25 cm high. The leaves alternate between having 5 and 7 soft, handlike lobes on straight, branchless stalks. After pollination, the white (sometimes reddish-tipped) flowers form raspberry-sized berries. Encapsulating between 5 and 25 drupelets, each fruit is initially pale red, ripening into an amber colour in early autumn.

Distribution and ecology

Cloudberries occur naturally throughout the Northern Hemisphere from 78°N, south to about 55°N, and very scattered south to 44°N mainly in mountainous areas. In Europe and Asia, they grow in the Nordic countries, especially in Finland; sometimes in the moorlands of Britain and Ireland, much in the Baltic states, and across northern Russia east to the Pacific Ocean. Small populations are also found further south, as a botanical vestige of the Ice Ages; it is found in Germany's Weser and Elbe valleys, where it is under legal protection. In North America, cloudberries grow wild across most of Canada / Alaska, and in the lower 48 states of the United States in northern Minnesota, New Hampshire, Maine, and a small population on Long Island, New York.

The cloudberry can withstand cold temperatures down to well below -40°C, but is sensitive to salt and to dry conditions. It grows in bogs, marshes and wet meadows and requires sunny exposures in acidic ground (between 3.5 and 5 pH).

Cloudberry leaves are food for caterpillars of several Lepidoptera species. The moth Coleophora thulea has no other known foodplants. See also List of Lepidoptera that feed on Rubus.

• (moroshka)
• Sakha: "" ("yt tingileghe")
• Siberian Yup'ik: "akavsik" (plural)
• lang-es mora de los pantanos, , , ,
• lang-sv hjortron (commonly used); , , , , (locally used)
• Yup'ik: "naunraq", "atsalugpiaq"

Trivia

The Norwegian municipality of Nesseby has a cloudberry in its coat-of-arms. The cloudberry fruit and leaves are also displayed on the national side of the Finnish €2 coins.

References

• Resvoll, T. R., 1925. Rubus chamaemorus L. A morphological - biological study. Nytt Magasin for Naturvidenskapene, 67: 55-129.
• Resvoll, T. R., 1925. Rubus chamaemorus L. Die geographische Verbreitung der Pflanze und ihre Verbreitungsmittel. Veröffentlichungen des Geobotanischen Institutes Rübel in Zürich, 3: 224-241.

External links

• "Northernberries" project: Domestication of Northern Berries
• Plants for a Future database report
• Den virtuelle floran - Distribution