The name Ribes originates from the Arabic Ribas (Rheum ribes L.). When the Arabic tribes landed in Spain they described the tast of the acid berries of wild Ribes shrubs with the well known rubatb taste...
Classification:
Division Spermatophyta
Subdivision Angiospermae
Class Magnoliopsida (dicotyledones)
Order Saxifragales
Family Grossulariaceae
Genus Ribes
Species uva-crispa (=R.grossularia)
There are a lot of cultivars known of what we call gooseberries. Only a limited number is still
in culture.
There are also some other species of Ribes which are classified under the english term 'gooseberry'
e.g. R. oxyacanthoides L. (Prairy gooseberry); R. cynos-bati (Prickly gooseberry); R. hirtellum (Northern gooseberry);
R. missourensis (Missouri gooseberry), R. rotundifolium (Wild gooseberry)
Characteristics: Growth form: shrubs, most often with spines
Leaves: decidious, alternate, simple, flat, stipules mostly absent
Leaf margins entire to dentate, lobed. palmetely veined
Flower: A raceme reduced to 1 (most often) -3 flowers.
Flower is regular, bisexual or dioecious, 4-5 united sepals; 4-5 united
petals; 4 - 5 stamens, isomerous with the perianth, ovary inferior, gynoecium with 2 carpels, the pistel one celled.
Ovary 1 locular, placentation parietal. Ovules (4-100) in the single cavity. Styles 2. 2 stigmas (undivided)
Fruit: berry with persistent calyx. Embryo-sac development of the Polygonum-type
Distribution:
About 150 species of Ribes in the temperate zone of the Northern hemisphere and the mountain areas of Mid- and South America.
Wild gooseberries are found in the Caucasian mountains, North Western Himalaya's, in the mountainous areas of North Africa and in a belt across Northern Europe.
