Rubus flagellarisWilld.

northern dewberry

WFO wfo-0001006809 Accepted WFO 2026-06 8 photographs CC0 / CC BY / CC BY-SA

Plate 1 figs. a–h · 8 separate observations

Rubus flagellaris, photographed by Fluff Berger
fig. a Fluff Berger, CC BY-SA 4.0 / 2022-05-22 / obs. 203071229
Rubus flagellaris, photographed by Navin Sasikumar
fig. b Navin Sasikumar, CC BY 4.0 / obs. 194291779
Rubus flagellaris, photographed by John Abrams
fig. c John Abrams, CC BY 4.0 / obs. 192272805
Rubus flagellaris, photographed by Steve Young
fig. d Steve Young, CC BY 4.0 / obs. 126217590
Rubus flagellaris, photographed by Catherine Sullivan
fig. e Catherine Sullivan, CC0 1.0 / obs. 124581335
Rubus flagellaris, photographed by Carrie Seltzer
fig. f Carrie Seltzer, CC BY 4.0 / obs. 126171836
Rubus flagellaris, photographed by Laura J. Costello
fig. g Laura J. Costello, CC BY 4.0 / obs. 78243468
Rubus flagellaris, photographed by Fives
fig. h Fives, CC BY 4.0 / obs. 77264820

Every figure is a research-grade observation under CC0, CC BY or CC BY-SA, rehosted with the photographer’s name, the licence and the observation it came from. Photographs under a NonCommercial licence are excluded from this site and are never stored, which costs us a great many pictures and is not negotiable.

Native range 46 botanical countries

Regions where Rubus flagellaris is native: Alabama, Arizona, Arkansas, Connecticut, Delaware, District of Columbia, Florida, Georgia, Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Kansas, Kentucky, Louisiana, Maine, Maryland, Mexico Central, Mexico Northeast, Mexico Northwest, Mexico Southwest, Michigan, Minnesota, Mississippi, Missouri, Nebraska, New Brunswick, New Hampshire, New Jersey, New Mexico, New York, North Carolina, Nova Scotia, Ohio, Oklahoma, Ontario, Pennsylvania, Prince Edward I., Québec, Rhode I., South Carolina, Tennessee, Texas, Vermont, Virginia, West Virginia, Wisconsin AlabamaArizonaArkansasConnecticutFloridaGeorgiaIllinoisIndianaIowaKansasKentuckyLouisianaMaineMarylandMexico CentralMexico NortheastMexico NorthwestMexico SouthwestMichiganMinnesotaMississippiMissouriNebraskaNew BrunswickNew HampshireNew JerseyNew MexicoNew YorkNorth CarolinaNova ScotiaOhioOklahomaOntarioPennsylvaniaPrince Edward I.QuébecSouth CarolinaTennesseeTexasVermontVirginiaWest VirginiaWisconsin DelawareDistrict of ColumbiaRhode I.
Native distribution of Rubus flagellaris, after Kew’s World Checklist of Vascular Plants. Introduced, extinct and doubtful records are excluded, so this is where the plant is from, not everywhere it now grows. Regions too small to draw at this scale are marked with a dot.
RegionTDWG codeContinent
Alabama ALA NORTHERN AMERICA
Arizona ARI
Arkansas ARK
Connecticut CNT
Delaware DEL
District of Columbia WDC
Florida FLA
Georgia GEO
Illinois ILL
Indiana INI
Iowa IOW
Kansas KAN
Kentucky KTY
Louisiana LOU
Maine MAI
Maryland MRY
Mexico Central MXC
Mexico Northeast MXE
Mexico Northwest MXN
Mexico Southwest MXS
Michigan MIC
Minnesota MIN
Mississippi MSI
Missouri MSO
Nebraska NEB
New Brunswick NBR
New Hampshire NWH
New Jersey NWJ
New Mexico NWM
New York NWY
North Carolina NCA
Nova Scotia NSC
Ohio OHI
Oklahoma OKL
Ontario ONT
Pennsylvania PEN
Prince Edward I. PEI
Québec QUE
Rhode I. RHO
South Carolina SCA
Tennessee TEN
Texas TEX
Vermont VER
Virginia VRG
West Virginia WVA
Wisconsin WIS

Region boundaries approximated from Natural Earth (public domain) and mapped to TDWG World Geographical Scheme for Recording Plant Distributions (WGSRPD) level-3 botanical countries (Brummitt 2001). Indicative, not the official WGSRPD geometry.

Flowering 1,089 in flower of 1,306 examined

Peak flowering in May. Each bar is the share of Rubus flagellaris observations in which someone actually recorded the reproductive state and found the plant in flower, not the raw number of flowering records. That distinction matters: people observe plants far more in spring than in winter, so a bare count of flowering records partly measures when people go outside. Dividing by the number examined removes that. 1,089 of 1,306 examined observations were in flower, every one of them research grade. The whisker on each bar is a 95% Wilson interval. 4 months have fewer than 5 examined observations, so no proportion is drawn for them. This is still a global aggregate and not a forecast for your garden: the same species flowers on different dates in different hemispheres. Where a species has fewer than 30 flowering records we do not draw this chart at all. Computed from 10.15468/dl.cgje2x.

Where it actually grows measured, from 1,946 observations

Condition 5th percentile Median 95th percentile
Coldest month, mean daily low -8.7 °C -3.8 °C 0.8 °C
Warmest month, mean daily high 23.6 °C 28.3 °C 31.2 °C
Annual rainfall 970 mm 1,185 mm 1,439 mm
Rainfall in the driest quarter 190 mm 254 mm 311 mm

It is found where winters bring hard frost. This is not care advice and it is not a forecast. It is a measurement: we sampled the climate at every one of the 1,946 research-grade observations of Rubus flagellaris that carry a coordinate, and this is the range those places actually span. The 5th and 95th percentiles are used rather than the minimum and maximum, because a single cultivated specimen in a heated conservatory should not widen a tropical plant's range to the Arctic.

This is not a hardiness zone. A USDA zone is the average annual extreme minimum temperature. The figure above is the mean daily minimum of the coldest month, which is a different quantity and is typically far warmer. Reading one as the other would place a plant several zones too warm, so we do not publish a hardiness zone, because we do not have one. Climate from CHELSA V2.1 (Karger et al. 2017); occurrences from 10.15468/dl.cgje2x.

Also published as 145 synonyms

A synonym is not an error. It is a record of botanists disagreeing, in print, about where this plant belongs. Each of these was somebody’s considered answer.

  • Rubus aboriginum Rydb.
  • Rubus alacer L.H.Bailey
  • Rubus alius L.H.Bailey
  • Rubus almus (L.H.Bailey) L.H.Bailey
  • Rubus apogaeus L.H.Bailey
  • Rubus aptatus L.H.Bailey
  • Rubus arenicola Blanch.
  • Rubus arenicola var. confictus L.H.Bailey
  • Rubus arizonensis Focke
  • Rubus ashei L.H.Bailey
  • Rubus austrinus L.H.Bailey
  • Rubus baileyanus Britton
  • Rubus beamanii Widrl. & B.P.Riley
  • Rubus bollianus L.H.Bailey
  • Rubus bonus L.H.Bailey
  • Rubus cacaponensis H.A.Davis & T.Davis
  • Rubus camurus L.H.Bailey
  • Rubus canaanensis H.A.Davis & T.Davis
  • Rubus canadensis var. roribaccus L.H.Bailey
  • Rubus cathartium Fernald
  • Rubus celer L.H.Bailey
  • Rubus centralis L.H.Bailey
  • Rubus clairbrownii L.H.Bailey
  • Rubus clandestinus L.H.Bailey

and 121 more.

Sourcesevery claim on this page

  1. World Flora Online Plant List. accepted name, authority, classification. CC0. Retrieved 2026-07-12.
  2. iNaturalist. photographs and flowering annotations, CC0 / CC BY / CC BY-SA only. per photograph. Retrieved 2026-06-27.
  3. Wikidata. common name (P1843), joined on the World Flora Online identifier (P7715). CC0. Retrieved 2026-07-13.
  4. Kew, World Checklist of Vascular Plants (WCVP v16). native distribution by TDWG level-3 botanical country, and life form. CC BY 3.0. Retrieved 2026-06-04.

We publish what we can source and we say so when we cannot. This page has no care advice and no toxicity claim, because we do not yet have those from a source we can cite.