PNW Native
Ranges widely across western North America.
Snowberry is a shrub that grows up to 2 m / 6 ft tall and abundantly forms thickets. It has simple, deciduous, opposite, oval leaves, small pink to white bell-shaped flowers in dense thickets, and is most easily identifiable due to the clusters of white berrylike drupes that persist on the bush through winter and pop like bubble wrap. (PM)
Common snowberry is widely used by various animals as both domestic graze and browse for wildlife. Larger ungulates, such as deer, moose, bighorn sheep, and elk rely on browsing snowberry, though different populations utilize the plant differently. In British Columbia, white-tailed deer and bighorn sheep browse snowberry fall through early spring. In Montana and Idaho, bighorn sheep eat snowberry plants during summer, and white-tailed deer eat it during summer and fall. There are conflicting reports on whether snowberry is heavily relied on by elk. In certain regions, like western Montana, Rocky Mountain Elk heavily utilize snowberry during early summer, but other states report little utilization of snowberry by elk even when availability is abundant. Studies of moose utilization of snowberry have found similar findings, including heavy wintertime usage along the Gallatin River in Montana but found to be unpalatable in other regions. Grizzly bears will commonly eat snowberry. (M)
Domestic cattle and sheep widely graze upon snowberry plants. During the latter part of the growth season, grazing on snowberry is crucial for cattle reaching their protein needs. In Oregon, Idaho, and South Dakota, cattle have been shown to widely eat snowberry. Snowberry is completely ignored by horses.
Small mammals and birds also rely heavily on snowberry for shelter as well as food including: sharp-tailed, ruffed, and blue grouse, western flycatcher, kingbird, western bluebird, wild turkey, desert cottontails, pocket gophers, and fox squirrels. Merriam’s turkeys use snowberry for cover in the Black Hills of South Dakota. Grouse extensively utilize snowberry for thermal cover, and in the Palouse prairie of SE Washington and SW Idaho, small mammals depend on snowberry for cover and habitat. The sites of pocket gopher burrows are located largely under snowberry thickets in NE Oregon, and desert cottontails inhabit the thickets in Nebraska. (M)
Snowberry is tolerant of a wide variety of different climates but is drought-tolerant and thrives in disturbed ecosystems, roadsides, forest margins, steep rocky hillsides, open forests, and along beaches. (PM) Snowberry forms dense thickets that block out other life forms due to its prolific rhizomatic spread (DM)
Common snowberry was occasionally eaten but not considered a choice berry by indigenous Northwest peoples. The fruits and leaves were mashed together into a poultice for sore eyes and cuts, tea from snowberry bark was used as a venereal disease and tuberculosis treatment, and a brew made from the whole plant was used as a health-boosting tonic. The stems were used to construct arrow shafts and pipe stems. (M)
The Chehalis tribe use snowberry as a hair soap and apply bruised snowberry leaf as a poultice, chewed snowberry leaves, or an infusion used as a wound rinse to cuts. They would also boil snowberry root bark and drink it three times a day to treat venereal disease. The Duwamish use snowberry to disinfect sores and believe that the abundance of snowberry predicts bountiful dog salmon runs because the white snowberry is the eye of dog salmon. The Skagit eat the berries as a poison antidote and emetic, drink a tea made from bark to treat tuberculosis, and make a weaker tea for babies with coated tongues. The S’Klallam use a tea made from the leaves as a cold remedy. Only the Squaxin amongst local tribes have been reported to dry and eat berries. (EG) Spokan women would harvest huckleberries by combing huckleberry bushes with switches made from snowberry twigs, causing ripe berries to fall from the bush into their baskets. The Kwakwaka’wakw use snowberry in their moxibustion to treat severe head and chest pain. The Stl’atl’imx consider the snowberry to be Saskatoon of the People in the Land of the Dead. Snowberry was widely used to make brooms, green leaves were used as dye, and they were widely used as clam skewers. Snowberries were used medicinally as an eye medicine, eyewash made from a branch infusion, infusion drank to prevent bedwetting, and a wart remover. (NT)
Snowberry has utility in restoration plantings due to its prolific abundance, drought tolerance, and ability to reclaim entire steep rocky mountain and hillsides, and it is a valued ornamental planting due to the decorative white berries that persist through winter. (DM)
[1] McWilliams, Jack. 2000. Symphoricarpos albus. In: Fire Effects Information System,. U.S. Department of Agriculture, Forest Service, Rocky Mountain Research Station, Fire Sciences Laboratory (Producer). Available: https://www.fs.fed.us/database/feis/plants/shrub/symalb/all.html.
