Meriwether’s Mistake: The Serendipitous Discovery of Snowberry
This botanical history post was featured on The Daily Gardener podcast:
August 13, 1805
My darling garden companions, gather 'round as I regale you with the most enchanting tale of botanical discovery!
On this day in 1805, our intrepid explorer Meriwether Lewis stumbled upon that most beguiling of shrubs, the Snowberry, or as the scientific cognoscenti call it, Symphoricarpos album.
What delicious irony, my verdant-thumbed confidantes, that while poor Lewis was desperately searching for the Shoshone Indians, he instead encountered this ghostly-berried beauty!
Such is the way of exploration – one sets out seeking one treasure only to discover another entirely.
Lewis, with his keen botanical eye (a quality I deeply admire in a man), recorded in his journal the discovery of something akin to small honeysuckle, except – and here's the marvelous part, my garden-shed devotees – it bore a berry "as large as a garden pea and as white as wax." How perfectly poetic his description!
This wasn't merely another plant to catalog, my petal-loving friends. No! This was a genuine scientific revelation! And I must commend Lewis on his botanical acumen, for when he suspected a relationship to honeysuckle, he was absolutely correct. The Snowberry is indeed a proud member of the honeysuckle family. The Latin name, derived from Greek, means "fruits joined together" – a reference to those delightful berries clustered in pairs like society gossips sharing secrets.
Now, between us garden enthusiasts, the berries themselves are rather disappointing to the palate – quite tasteless affairs. However, our feathered friends, particularly grouse, find them absolutely irresistible!
One creature's disappointment is another's delight, wouldn't you agree?
Being the meticulous collector he was, Lewis likely preserved specimens of this alabaster wonder. We know with certainty that seeds eventually reached Philadelphia, where they were entrusted to none other than Thomas Jefferson's favored nurseryman – the esteemed Bernard McMahan.
McMahan, true to form, my darling dirt-diggers, cultivated these botanical treasures and dispatched cuttings to Jefferson himself.
By October 1812, Jefferson penned a letter to McMahan declaring that the Snowberries were positively thriving in his garden.
With characteristic enthusiasm, he declared them,
"some of the most beautiful berries I have ever seen."
And isn't that just like Jefferson?
Always with an eye for beauty, whether in democracy or decorative shrubs! I find myself wondering, dear garden enthusiasts, if you might consider adding this native wonder to your own horticultural sanctuaries?
A living piece of American exploration history, wrapped in waxy white berries – what could be more delightful for our garden narratives?
