Cloudberry
Latin name: Rubus chamaemorus
Height: 20-25cm
Where: Wet boggy moorland and mountainsides
When: Summer for possible flowers and fruit
When it’s not fruiting it would be hard to guess that the cloudberry is actually a relation of brambles and raspberries. It is a small, unassuming plant that nestles high among the blaeberries and heather of our moors and mountains. It is a true sub-Arctic species, more often found in Scandinavia than Scotland. Possibly because of this we rarely see its snowy flowers or ruddy orange fruit in our Scottish hills. Its leaves look a little like those of blackcurrants, but of course without their aromatic smell.
Its romantic-sounding name – ‘cloudberry’ – actually comes from the Old English word ‘clud’, meaning ‘hill’, rather than from its habit of growing high on the mountainside among the clouds!
