Ribes sanguineum seed

LATIN NAME: Ribes sanguineum

COMMON NAME: Flowering Currant

The flowering currant is a handsome, upright, many-branched, deciduous shrub of the gardens, and its fine, rounded, softly hairy, lobed leaves and its drooping heads of the many small, rose-pink or red, tubular flowers, followed by the small, round, dark, bloomy berries, have made it one of the most cheerful of the spring shrubs of the garden. It grows as an upright, many-branched, deciduous shrub, reaching up to three metres or so, with the upright, branching stems bearing the alternate, rounded, lobed, softly hairy leaves and, through the spring, the drooping heads of the many small, rose-pink or red, tubular flowers, followed by the small, round, dark, bloomy berries of the many small seeds. It is a species of the flowering shrub in the gooseberry family, and it is native to the woodlands of the western North America, while it is grown as a treasured ornamental shrub, and it is known as the flowering currant.

In the gooseberry family it is the early bloomer of the clan, the shrub that hangs its pink tassels out before most of the garden has woken up.

Scientific Research & Plant Biotechnology

The flowering currant belongs in the spring-nectar studies of the garden as one of the first generous sources of the season, and the bee researchers have watched the early foragers work its drooping heads of the tubular, rose-pink flowers. The hummingbirds of its home range are equally fond of it, and the ornithologists of the west coast have noted the shrub among the early foods they take. The botanists have sorted out its place in the gooseberry family and the woodlands of the western North America, and the horticulturists have bred the garden forms for the deeper colours. It is a shrub the researchers count among the useful early nectar plants, and the growers of the spring garden keep it in their catalogues.

Ecological & Economic Value & Wide Applications

In the spring border, the flowering currant is the first pink flush of the year. Its drooping heads of the rose-pink, tubular flowers are an early source of the nectar for the bees and the hummingbirds, its small, dark berries feed the birds of the summer, and the dense, leafy growth gives cover and shelter. It makes a fine, easy shrub for the many gardens of the world, and it asks only for the moist, well-drained ground and a place in the sun. Rose-pink, early and bee-filled.

The seeds come out of the dark berries easily — rinse them clean and sow them thinly in pots of moist, loamy compost at a shallow depth, stand the pots in the open air through the winter so they feel the cold, then keep them gently watered in a bright spot, and the little seedlings will be sprouting in the spring, ready to hang out their first pink tassels.