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Gaultheria hispidula
Also called Cancer Wintergreen, Maidenhair Berry, Moxieplum, Snowberry, Hairy False Wintergreen, Moxie Plum
Creeping snowberry is a low, evergreen, mat-forming shrub native to cold northern North America, grown mainly for its wintergreen-scented leaves and edible white berries. It needs cool, moist, acidic soil and does best in shade or part shade.
Gaultheria hispidula, commonly known as the creeping snowberry or moxie-plum, and known to Mi'kmaq tribes of Newfoundland as manna teaberry, is a perennial spreading ground-level vine of the heath family Ericaceae. It is native to North America and produces small white edible berries. It fruits from August to September. Its leaves and berries taste and smell like wintergreen. The species epithet hispidula refers to the bristles on the stems and leaves.
Gaultheria hispidula grows in acidic and neutral soils in open woodland and forest verges, particularly on wet ground such as in or on the edge of bogs, often near tree stumps. Its original range spread from far northern Canada to as far south as North Carolina, but it has been extirpated from the southerly portions of its original range.
The Algonquin people use an infusion of the leaves as a tonic for overeating. They also use the fruit as food. The Anticosti use it as a sedative, and the Mi'kmaq decoct the leaves or the whole plant for an unspecified purpose. The Ojibwa people use the leaves to make a beverage. Etymologist Frederic Cassidy hypothesized that such medicinal uses of the "moxie-plum", or another similarly-named plant, inspired the name of the 1870s patent medicine and later soft drink Moxie.
Scarlet Snowberry · Gaultheria fragrantissima · Gaultheria insipida · Prickly Heath · Snowberry · Eastern teaberry · Salal · Snowberry
Text excerpted from the Wikipedia article Gaultheria hispidula by its contributors, under CC BY-SA 4.0; the excerpts and the care summary drawn from them are shared under the same licence.
The care summary was written by AI (Claude, Anthropic) from the sources on this page, with general growing knowledge where they are silent. Check before relying on it.
Life form, climate and native range: World Checklist of Vascular Plants, Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew (CC BY 3.0), reformatted; see Plants of the World Online.
