PlantFiles: Oregon Grape, Oregon Grape Holly, Holly-leaved Barberry
Mahonia aquifolium

Oregon grape grows wild in Northcentral Idaho. It makes excellent tasting and beautiful jams and is a pretty plant all year. I don't find it aggressive at all. It prefers at least some shade and grows in total shade here.

Adaptable native for the Pacific Northwest. Needs very little care and grows sun or shade, poor dry soil. Evergreen, and grows moderately slowly.

This plant grows wild in wooded areas all around Idaho. We're at 2,700 feet, and I've seen it in the mountains much higher than that. I have several volunteer shrubs in my own garden, growing in dry, almost-full shade. They had a lot of flowers this Spring because of the wet winter, and now there are lots of berries. The problem is that it's nearly impossible to get rid of! I am constantly having to pull out volunteers with deep, extensive root systems all over the shaded areas of my garden. I like the fragrance of the flowers, and this shrub is certainly care-free, but I do not want a garden full of Oregon Grape. I'd say be careful where you plant it, and be sure to keep it in bounds, or you may have a lot more Oregon Grape than you planned on!

This plant grows wild in the Black Hills of South Dakota and we use it in our christmas wreaths. In the fall the leaves turn a burgundy to bright red color and add a handsome green to the green of the fresh spruce and pine.

The first three of our four years in Payson, Az, our Oregon Grape Holly was visited annually by the single-note-calling phainopepla in summer for the grapes. I thought the fruit was bland. The blossoms before are very aromatic, almost cloying. Our O. G. H. are being infested with a web making insect similar to the tent caterpillar. I've had to raze a couple to the ground. They do put up shoots elsewhere, so I don't think their in danger of elimination. I just wish I knew what the insect is.

The only maintenance I've had to do is prune the tops out to keep it compact. I was able to root one of these cuttings to plant for the future.
The mockingbirds love to eat the berries.

I've had this plant for fifteen or twenty years at 1100 feet in the northwest corner of Connecticut and it's as carefree as anything can be. It's in complete shade until late afternoon, spreads very slowly, and comes back when we thought it was dead. It's still barely two feet high but six feet wide. We clip it occasionally for holly decorations at Christmas.

A very hardy plant, not just in terms of temperature. The previous owner of our property went through and sprayed everything with RoundUp, and we were sure the Oregon Grape was dead. To our surprise, is wasn't!

Says full sun... according to conventional wisdom around the Willamette Valley, it's a shade plant. It's very rarely seen growing in full sun around here. Our patch grows in full dry shade, and is thriving.

The yellow flowers are rather ugly up close, but stunning from a distance. The berries are a little too tart to eat straight, but make a wonderful jam. A must-have for the PNW.

Growing very well in almost full shade--probably needs it during our hot Alabama summers. Companions are Japanese Fatsia, Japanese Maple (Crimson Queen) and Cast Iron Plant.

I see this plant marked for sun, but I have grown it very successfully in shade in Piedmont of NC, and in Houston, TX.
It is outstanding in shade with red folliage in fall, bright yellow blooms in spring and olive shaped dark purple blue fruits in summer. An interesting shape, very hardy, not needing maintenance. Goes with azaleas, but will stand even less light.

I just moved into this new neighborhood in Hope, BC Canada, in December. One of the first native plants to pop up in the area (in Feb.) is the Oregon Grape. They grow everywhere around here! I can't wait to see the fruits and flowers..It is a very woodsy area around here, lots of shade under large trees, but alot of heat and sunlight in summer. They really seem to thrive under the canopy of trees, with all of the natural mulch.....

This plant varies from a stout shrub with many erect stems to a creeping form with an underground rhizome. Shiny holly-like leaves and chalky blue berries identify this plant common to pine forests of western Canada, northwestern CA, NV, TX, Co, SD and western MT.

Native Americans used the bark to make a yellow dye. The berries are eaten by man and beasy alike and they make a nice jelly.

Yes, of course it grows here! This is its prime growing location. It grows on the north slope around my house (on a north-facing scarp) but you won't find it growing naturally in the open sun-baked flatland or on western or southern exposures unless somewhat shaded. It's extremely hardy. I'm at an elevation of of a little over 4,200FT and it grows way up higher in the mountains around here that can get 6'+ of snow in the winter. In addition to that, here in the Klamath Basin, the moisture content during the winter is basically nill when the wind blows and the temperatures go below freezing. The same thing happens in the summer with high temperatures and wind with little humidity. This plant shows no sign of stress in either situation as long as its roots are shaded and the soil stays a little moist. As for the berries, they are a little tart and seedy, but I have heard many accounts of the tremendous jelly they make, like from a grape, but more tart(added suger of course). I haven't ever gathered the berries from the bushes around my house for lack of time and anyone I could give them to to make jelly, but I did notice a huge increase in mice in and outside my house this year due to a heavy crop of all berry-bushes around my house(we've been in a drought and had a "decent" snow last winter, so the wild plants around here went crazy this year with flowers & fruit). Gathering the berries might be a good idea if you live in an area prone to rodents. I have never seen birds actually eating the berries, and there are still many left on the bushes yet. Maybe when the ground is coverd in snow, the birds will come looking for the berries. Like I said, the ground around here hasn't had snow on it ,for any lenghth of time,in about 10 years.

Native to the West Coast of the USA from Northern California to Vancouver , Canada . Very abundant on the east side of the Cascades in open forest . Grows in part shade to full sun . Growing abundantly here in zone 5 and wild specimens here have survived recent winters as cold as -25 F . Very tolerant of heat , cold and drought once established . There are actually 3 species of Oregon Grape growing here . (1) Berberis Nervosa or Oregon Grape, a low growing shrub 4 - 12 inches high . (2) Berberis Aquifolium or Tall Oregon Grape , very similiar to b.nervosa only growing to heights in excess of 6 feet . This species makes a wonderful inpenetrable hedge . (3) Berberis Repens or Creeping Oregon Grape , a low spreading shrub found east of the Cascades .

The berries of Oregon Grape are edible although very sour . Each berry also contains 1 - 4 seeds . I am in process now of collecting seed from various elevations in the cascades for cold stratification this winter.