Northern Ontario Plant Database

Plant Description

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Ribes hirtellum Michx.

En: swamp gooseberry, smooth gooseberry, hairystem gooseberry, wild gooseberry, northern gooseberry
Fr: groseillier hérissé, groseillier marécages, groseillier à trois fleurs
Oj: zhaaboomin, zhaaboominagaawanzh

Grossulariaceae (Currant Family)

The Genus Ribes: Gooseberries and currents both belong to the family Grossulariaceae (formerly part of the Saxifragaceae – the Saxifrage Family), but currents have saucer-shaped flowers borne in long racemes, while gooseberries have tubular flowers borne singly or in small clusters in the leaf axils. Gooseberries belong to subgenus Grossularia (Mill.) Richard.

General: a straggling or erect, deciduous shrub, to 1 m tall. The bark is grayish, twigs are smooth (glabrous) or bear scattered bristle-like prickles that fall with the outer bark after the first year; the nodes bear 1–3 spines, 3–8 mm long.

Leaves: Alternate, simple, palmately-lobed, petiolate. Leaf blades 2.5–6 cm long, with 3–5 lobes divided less than halfway to the midrib; upper surface dark green, glabrous to slightly hairy; lower surface hairy and with scattered glandular hairs; leaf base tapering (cuneate), flat (truncate), or slightly heart-shaped (cordate); lobes are oblong to rounded, with blunt (obtuse) apices and coarsely-toothed (serrate) margins; the 1–3 cm petiole bears a few scattered hairs. Plants (var. calcicola Fernald) growing on limestone or other basic substrates have leaves that are very hairy on the lower surface.

Flowers: Bisexual, light greenish-yellow to purplish, pendant, borne singly or in few-flowered clusters in the leaf axils, the short flower stalks (pedicels) smooth and glandless; bracts subtending the flowers have margins bearing long hairs (ciliate margins). Calyx tubular to bell-shaped (campanulate), 6–9 mm long, with 5 short, narrow lobes; petals 5, small, attached between the calyx lobes; stamens 5, usually longer than the petals (exserted); the single pistil with a smooth, inferior ovary. Flowers bloom in early spring.

Fruit: An edible, green to purplish-black, smooth berry; globose, 8–12 mm in diameter. Fruits mature in summer.

Habitat and Range: Rocky shores, riverbanks, wet woods, bogs, and clearings. The smooth gooseberry, a boreal North American species, occurs throughout Ontario.

Internet Images: The Ribes hirtellum webpage, from the Robert W. Freckmann Herbarium, Plants of Wisconsin website.

Images of Ribes hirtellum from Andy Fyon's Northern Ontario Wildflowers website.

Similar Species: Ribes oxyacanthoides, the bristly wild gooseberry or northern gooseberry, is most similar to Ribes hirtellum, the wild gooseberry, since both have purplish-black smooth berries, but Ribes oxyacanthoides has stems with prickles along the internodes in addition to the 1–3 stout spines borne at each node, while the stems of R. hirtellum are smooth between the internodes. See other images of Ribes oxyacanthoides from Colin's Virtual Herbarium.

Comparison chart of gooseberry species native to northern Ontario

	Ribes cynosbati (prickly gooseberry)	Ribes hirtellum (wild gooseberry)	Ribes oxyacanthoides (bristly wild gooseberry)
fruit	deep red, prickly	green to purplish-black, smooth
lower leaf surface	hairy, with glandular hairs along the veins, without resin dots	smooth to slightly hairy, without glandular hairs or resin dots	slightly hairy, with glandular hairs along the veins and resin dots between the veins
twigs	young twigs finely hairy, older twigs usually smooth, except densely prickly in var. atrox	twigs smooth	young twigs finely hairy, older twigs with scattered prickles
nodes	with 1–3 stout spines

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