Vaccinium membranaceum

Thinleaf huckleberry

Family: Ericaceae · Type: shrub · Native

Thinleaf huckleberry is a California native shrub found in the Klamath Ranges, northern Coast Ranges, northern Sierra Nevada, and Warner Mountains in wet meadows and mountain slopes at elevations of 1,100 to 2,200 meters. Flowering from June to July, this plant produces pink, cylindric to urn-shaped flowers less than 6 millimeters long. Growing 5 to 15 decimeters tall with erect stems that are weakly angled and yellow-green, it forms an upright shrub with an occasional rhizome. Its deciduous leaves are thin and membranous, generally ovate to elliptic, 2 to 5 centimeters long with serrated edges that feature gland-tipped hairs and prominent veins underneath. The fruit is a black (occasionally dark red) berry approximately 9 to 11 millimeters in diameter.

Habitat: Wet meadows, mountain slopes

Bloom period: Jun-Jul

Elevation: 1100-2200 m

Bioregions: KR, NCoRH, n SNH, Wrn

California counties: Siskiyou, Plumas, Sierra, Modoc, Humboldt, Trinity, Tulare, Butte, Shasta, Del Norte, Yuba, Mariposa, El Dorado

Data from The California Species Project — 14,000+ California species with verified data from CNPS, CDFW, USFWS, Jepson eFlora, Cal-IPC, and more.