1. Vaccinium arboreum Marshall (farkleberry, sparkleberry)
V. arboreum var. glaucescens (Greene) Sarg.
Batodendron
arboreum (Marshall)
Nutt.
Pl. 375 f, g;
Map 1645
Plants medium to
tall shrubs or small trees 2–5 m tall. Bark brown, longitudinally furrowed,
peeling in thin plates with age. Twigs sparsely to densely hairy, green or
reddish-tinged, becoming gray with age. Leaf blades 20–55 mm long, 12–30 mm
wide, thick and leathery, oblanceolate to broadly elliptic-obovate, the tip
usually rounded (sometimes with a minute, abrupt point) or obtusely narrowed to
a blunt point, the margins often with widely spaced, minute, glandular teeth;
less commonly entire, otherwise glabrous or hairy, the upper surface glabrous,
waxy and shiny, the undersurface dull, glabrous to sparsely hairy along the
midvein. Inflorescences short racemes or of solitary flowers. Flower stalks 4–10
mm long, with a conspicuous collarlike joint at the junction with the flower,
often at least the lowermost stalks with small, leaflike bracts at the base.
Calyx lobes 0.7–1.0 mm long, the margins sparsely hairy toward the tip.
Corollas 2.5–3.0 mm long, 3–4 mm in diameter, broadly urn-shaped to nearly
bell-shaped, white, shallowly lobed, the lobes reflexed. Stamens not exserted,
with 2 yellow spurs at the filament-anther junction, these slightly shorter
than to about as long as the anther tubules, the filaments flattened, hairy
along the margins, the anthers tapered to tubules 1.5–2.0 mm long. Styles 4–5
mm, slightly exserted. Fruits 6–10 mm in diameter, black, shiny, not glaucous.
2n=24. May–July.
Scattered to
common in the Mississippi Lowlands, Ozark, and Ozark Border Divisions,
extending into the Lincoln Hills Section of the Glaciated Plains (eastern [mostly
southeastern] U.S. west to Kansas and Texas). Mesic to dry upland forests,
margins of glades, and tops of bluffs, occasionally banks of streams or margins
of swamps, on acidic substrates.
The berries of V.
arboreum have a mealy flesh and are considered unpalatable.