Grows wild here, as it is a native shrub. And blooms very early - nearly before anything else other than maybe forsythia. While it looks completely at home in a natural environment, it is a gangly, leggy, awkward looking shrub that somehow I just don't see as an attractive ornamental addition to a cultivated garden. But it might fit in just dandy to your woodlot :-)

Characteristic of sites that are damp in winter and prone to drought in summer in the wild. It coming from my region I wonder about its tolerance for alkalinity.

Like Arctostaphylos Arbutus is a dry climate/site Heath family species that is not lime hating. In fact it has been observed that Madrona growing near a cement plant in Seattle do not have the foliar disease issues that many other examples in the area have developed in later years.

When two of us were visiting Kew one year an unlabeled Oemleria growing and flowering by itself in a lawn was a source of fascination for what appeared to me to be a British couple.

In think it was the only one we saw in UK on that trip. Of course, here in its native area we have lots of them.

It grows all over my place in the undeveloped areas under alders and Acer macrophyllums. I agree with GardenGal that it's not appropriate in a cultivated garden.It's also known as Indian Plum or June Berry.

I tried to make the most of it in this picture.

Summer at 8-01-14

At present, just as you enter the gardens at the National Trust's Killerton house in Devon (UK) you are greeted by the wonderful smell of this bush (at the Dairy gate). I would grow it just for its aroma! Wish I had your seeds...

I think that can be arranged. :-) E-mail me.

First native shrub with conventional flowers to bloom each year in this area, leaves remain a vernal green all season and the orange, becoming bluish fruits are visually appealing.