Many winterberry shrubs here still contain swarms of red fruit within the graying roadsides, as you see from these images taken yesterday. These plants are unlike other fruiting trees and shrubs that ripen when it’s warm and get eaten then. These provide brilliant color well into winter.
Winterberry shrubs (Ilex verticillata), as do other American hollies, produce fruits that ripen late, are not as nutritious as many other fruits, and contain bad-tasting compounds that don’t dissipate until the winter months. They apparently are designed to avoid competition with many plants that produce seed and fruit for migrating birds.
The winterberry theory apparently is that, by delaying fruit ripening until many birds are gone and the remaining resident birds are less particular about what they eat, the plant is avoiding competition and maximizing its chances to have its seeds dispersed nearby, where the soil has proved compatible. (Images taken in Brooklin, Maine, on October 28, 2024.)