Al Schneider's Rocky Mountains Plant Descriptions

Common Red Raspberry
Rubus idaeus
Rose family (Rosaceae)

Raspberries are a favorite, eaten on the trail or taken home to be enjoyed as pie fillings or preserves. Stems can grow into long arching round canes forming dense tangles but most commonly in the mountains are straight and only two or three feet tall. Leaves are rich in vitamin C and their astringent qualities have a long history of medical uses. "Rubus," the ancient Latin name for the plant, means "red." "Idaeus" honors Mount Ida, south of the ancient city of Troy. This plant was named by Linnaeus in 1753 and it has had dozens of names since then. The North American variety of this species is very similar to the European one that Linnaeus saw.


©2008 Zoya Akulova

Description

Erect shrub, 1-5' tall, with or slender straight prickles on stem. , , divided into 3-5 egg-shaped, pointed, double saw- . Flowers white with 5 white petals and 5 that bend backward. develop into red woolly-hairy . Flowers and in nodding clusters.

Field Marks

Prickly shrub with usually upright short branches, egg-shaped , white flowers, and red .

© Al Schneider

A leaf is compound when multiple leaflets are on the same stem.

A perennial plant lives and blooms for many years.

Usually green, sepals typically function as protection for the flower in bud, and often as support for the petals when in bloom.

Glands are plant structures that secrete liquids, salts or other substances. Glands often appear as hairs with a drop of liquid at the end.

Like the teeth on a saw, leaves and other surfaces can have toothed edges.

fruit -- any seed-bearing structure in flowering plants. It is formed from the ovary after flowering.

pinnate -- A compound leaf with two rows of leaflets.

leaflets -- Each little leaf-like thing in a compound leaf is a leaflet.

bristle -- A straight, stiff hair.

drupe -- A fruit in which an outer fleshy part surrounds a hardened shell containing a seed. A peach is a drupe. A raspberry is composed of drupelets.

leaves alternate along the main stem and are attached singly.