Islands of Light

By Pete Salmansohn

If you’ve been driving along our rural roads lately, you’ve probably noticed your glance being pulled away from the highway and into the woods toward a bright burst of white amidst an otherwise dark forest. 

It’s hard not to notice these brilliant little islands of light, and if you stopped the car and hiked over to see what’s going on, you’d likely discover clusters of fine white flowers growing on the twigs of a small, shrubby tree.  In mid-April, there’s only one thing that could be, and that’s Shadbush (Amelanchier canadensis) – the tree whose delightful blossoming coincides with shad migrating up the Hudson to spawn.

In other parts of the country not so lucky as to have had shad in their rivers, the little tree is known as Juneberry or Serviceberry.  Its edible purplish-blue berries, prized by wildlife, do mature in June, and hence the name, but the designation Serviceberry is more complex, and in my opinion, more intriguing.  As the story goes, the name was given by people living in isolated hill towns in Appalachia who were cut off from having church services in winter because of snow-clogged road and trails.  When spring’s advance eventually led to the opening of these byways, it enabled the preacher to make his first visit and thus hold the first service of the year.

In another, perhaps less well-known interpretation of the legend, when the Serviceberry tree bloomed that meant the frozen soil had finally thawed and bodies which couldn’t be buried during the winter could finally be interred.

Shadbush is one of the many varied members of the Rose family and typically grows along drier stream banks, on hillsides in open woods, and along fence rows.   In the wild, it can be found from southern Quebec all the way to Georgia. It’s also widely used in landscaping and a number have been graciously planted around homes in Philipstown.  Shadbush is considered an understory tree, rarely reaching more than thirty five or forty feet tall, and is hence easily overlooked. But in April, when our eyes seek color and form after months of winter, brown trees, and gray boulders and ledge, Shadbush pleases us with its brief two-week flowering, providing a delightful preview of things to come.