Native Garden Plant Factsheets

Snowberry (PEPKÍOŦIȽĆ / pəpq̕əyaθíɬč)

Illustration by Sabrina Saenko

English Name(s): Snowberry, also Waxberry, & Ghostberry
Scientific Name: Symphoricarpos Albus
SENĆOŦEN Name: PEPKÍOŦIȽĆ or PEPKIYOSIȽĆ (bush), PEPKÍOS (berries)
lək̓ʷəŋən Name: pəpq̕əyaθíɬč (bush), pəpq̕əyas (berries)

Fun Facts:
This plant grows from 0.5 to 2m tall, distinguished for its thin stems. Its leaves are around 2-5cm long, smooth or lobed, elliptical, and sometimes hairy on the underside. The 0.5-0.7cm bell-shaped pink to white flowers grow in small dense clusters, before the waxy-looking white snowberries (0.6-1.5cm across) develop.

Traditional Uses:
Snowberries are often considered poisonous, though one or two may sometimes be eaten to settle the stomach after fatty food. The sticks could be used for drying salmon, skewering clams, or making brooms. The bark could be bathed with to stop itches, while bathing with the sticks made one's legs stronger. Crushed snowberries could be applied to the skin to stop burns, rashes, sores, and warts, or used as an antiperspirant. Tea could be made with the roots to treat stomach disorders, or with the twigs to treat fevers. Given the high amount of saponins in the berries, they can be used as shampoo to clean hair.

Blooms: May to August
Season: September to October, persisting through winter
Habitat: Dry to moist sites at sea level to middle elevations such as along beaches, river terraces, clearings, thickets, open forests, ravines, and rocky slopes
Range: From Southeastern Alaska and Haida Gwaii south to Southern California, also in every Canadian province and in the non-Southern US

Further Sources:

https://nativeplantspnw.com/common-snowberry-symphoricarpos-albus/
Saanich Ethnobotany by Nancy J. Turner & Richard J. Hebda
Plants of Coastal British Columbia by Jim Pojar & Andy MacKinnon

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