Very early on I wrote about elderberry (read it, but know that it’s not my best work) and I promised myself I’d write a whole separate article on specifically elderflower. I can definitely do better now!

At some point I will probably redo that old article since I think I can make it more comprehensive, but for now enjoy this look into one of the most elegant early summer flowers;

Scientific Name: Sambucus canadensis, S. nigra, and others

Preferred Habitat: Roadsides, forest margins, fields, near ponds, and at the edges of open spaces in the forest.

Edible Parts: Berries, flowers (the main focus today)

Distribution: Most of North America has some kind of edible species of elder, but today I will mostly be talking about S. canadensis

Harvest Season: Early summer, June in my region

Key Identifiers: This is one of the few shrubs that are blooming with large clusters of cream white flowers. The leaves are oppositely arranged, and spear shaped. The shrub is generally anywhere between 4-8ft wide and tall depending on the age.

Toxic Look-Alikes: There are a few flowers that can get confused with elder species. Elderberry has woody gray bark on the stem like a bush, and some look-alikes such as water hemlock grow like a tall flower or have hairy green stems with purple splotches.

Some dogwood species can get mixed up with elder if you haven’t seen an elderberry flower before but they tend to be much smaller clusters and the flowers themselves are larger.

Nutrition:

Thankfully, elder actually has a lot of study to back up the nutritional claims!

Elderflower has the following benefits:

Elderflower can be taken as a tincture, tea, cordial, or eaten fresh under some circumstances (more on that below), and is often made into syrups, desserts, battered and fried into fritters, infused into liqueurs, used in cocktails, brewed into fermented beverages, made into tonics, added to ciders, or used as an ingredient in oxymels.

Because elder attracts so many pollinators, the plant also makes an incredible support plant for several guilds including apples, chestnut, hazelnut, and pawpaw! This is a must have for your food forest.

Elder shrubs are incredibly easy to grow within their native range. I don’t even water or feed mine and they seem to thrive regardless!

The first year, many plants will die back in order to establish roots better, but in subsequent years the shrubs will explode with growth!

The flowers will appear usually around mid-late June.

With some plants, taking off a lot of blooms will reduce the amount of fruit you get. With elder, you actually should pick at least 1/3 to 2/3s of the blooms off in order to get larger yields and bigger berries later in the season!

Some elderberry (maybe most?) cultivars seem to produce more shoots at the base that can be dug up and split off into new plants. This is actually how I’ve gotten the majority of my elderberry shrubs.

It is also beneficial to cut elderberry back to a few inches from the ground every fall to encourage new growth, but it isn’t totally necessary.

Elderberry cultivars tend to prefer a second variety for good yields even if they’re labelled as “self fertile”. Wild ones will often produce fruit regardless because they have enough genetic diversity on their own to do so.

One note on growing elderberry: sometimes at big nurseries you may find a purple leafed elderberry or a “flowering” varieties but these are most often strictly ornamental and NOT edible!

If you want an edible variety, buy a cultivar specifically for consumption or forage wild ones!

Most elderberry species are actually toxic when raw.

The exception to this is American Elder (Sambucus canadensis) which actually does NOT contain those same toxic compounds!

The reason this is important is because with European Elder (Sambucus nigra) you need to cook it in order to make it safe to eat. This actually destroys some of the nutrients (up to 40% or more). When making syrup, this is usually combined with high amounts of sugar, which has much less benefit than people probably expect.

Since American elder has none of these compounds, it can be cold-pressed and just warmed up enough to dissolve some honey if needed. We have usually made tinctures with the fruit but will probably do so with the flowers as well this year.

Elderberry is also incredibly easy to propagate. When the plant is dormant, simply take a pencil-thick cutting off the plant, and stick it in the ground. The cutting will form roots when it comes out of dormancy and boom! New plant.

The propagation rate is around 80%+ so I’d take more cuttings than you need.

As mentioned previously, here are my recommended cultivars for the Midwest region (there is at least one variety adapted to every state!)

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