Wisconsin Wild Blueberry Plants

Lowbush Blueberry

• Growing in all but 16 of Wisconsin's counties, lowbush blueberry (Vaccinium angustifolium) is a sprawling, low shrub between 6 inches and 2 feet tall and up to 2 feet wide. A multistemmed, densely twigged plant, it has attractive foliage. The glossy leaves progress from greenish-red to deep greenish-blue and finally to autumn's reddish-purple. In May and June, lowbush blueberry has clusters of pale pink flowers. Its berries ripen in July and August. It grows wild in sandy clearings.

Blue Ridge Blueberry

• Also called early lowbush blueberry, Blue Ridge blueberry (Vaccinium pallidum) blooms from the end of may until the end of June and bears fruit in August. Designated a State Special Concern plant in Wisconsin, it has dull green leaves with nearly white undersides and drooping clusters of small white blooms. Its nearly black fruit has sweet, heavily seeded pulp. This blueberry normally stands 2 to 3 feet tall.

Highbush Blueberry

• Highbush blueberry (Vaccinium corymbosum) is the source of most commercially produced blueberries in the United States. Rare the Wisconsin wilds, it grows as a 6-to 12-foot tall and wide, rounded shrub. Notable for its foliage's red, orange, purple or yellow fall color, it has white or pink, May and June flowers. Its July and August berries feed up to 30 species of birds, reports the Lady Bird Johnson Wildflower Center. Rabbits and deer eat the plant's foliage.

Velvetleaf Blueberry

• Velvetleaf blueberry (Vaccinium myrtilloides) -- also called called Canada blueberry and velvetleaf huckleberry -- ranges anywhere from 4 inches to 3 feet high. One of these colonizing plants can spread more than 30 feet, thanks to a branching root system. Reported in all but 22 of the state's counties, this is the second most common of Wisconsin's wild blueberries. It has bright green foliage and purple- to pink-tinged, white flower clusters with bright to deep blue berries. This berry is happiest in moist soils along forest edges and in swamps and bogs, according to the Lady Bird Johnson Wildflower Center.

Dwarf Blueberry

• Dwarf blueberry (Vaccinium caespitosum) is actually a bilberry plant, according to Michigan State University Extension. Blooming between May and August -- depending on its location -- this 6-inch to 1-foot-high shrub produces single flowers along its stems, instead of clusters of blooms. Its green leaves and sweet, June- to August, blue berries are much smaller than those of true blueberries. Like velvetleaf blueberry, this spreading bush is most common in Wisconsin's northeastern counties.