Our first showy tree blossoms of spring are popping out all around us now. Alternatively known as shadbush or serviceberry, assorted varieties of Amelanchier are dressing up the edges of roads and fields with their beautiful white flowers. Other trees – maples, for instance – have flowered already but their blossoms are tiny compared to shadbush’s, which match the apple in size and visibility.
Both of its common names are linked directly with the time of its arrival. “Shadbush” connects it to the spring runs of American shad, an ocean-going herring that returns to spawn in late winter and early spring in many east coast rivers. When the shad are running, the shadbush is in blossom, though that is probably more accurate south of our home in central Vermont. Shad don’t get this far upriver any more, not being able to get past the various dams in the Connecticut River, but downstream I expect their spawning runs will have slowed down by now, and the shadbush blossoms will have been superseded by apples.
While shadbush is not exactly an elegant name, serviceberry makes up for it and provides a little bit of poetry. Back in the day, people who died in the winter could not be buried until the ground thawed out in spring. Thus, there were many funeral services waiting to happen in the spring as the ground thawed. Flowers for the services came from the only available flowering shrub, Amelanchier, which became known as serviceberry.
It has a number of other nicknames – Juneberry and shadblow are two others you might hear. I think that people have been so determined to bestow a name on this otherwise ordinary shrub because it stands out so proudly at a time when we all need to see something beautiful. And it does indeed usher in a whole wave of flowering fruit trees and shrubs that make May so brilliant. Let the service begin.
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