Empetrum eamesii, common name purple crowberry, is a North American species of dwarf evergreen shrub.
Description The species forms a low-lying shrub with prostrate stems, forming a mat on the ground. Leaves are alternate or in whorls. Flowers are solitary near the tips of branches, each with 3 white petals. Fruits are spherical, pink or red in subsp. earnsii, purple to reddish-purple in subsp. atropurpureum.Flora of North America v 8 p 488.photo of isotype of Empetrum eamesii at Missouri Botanical GardenBoivin, Joseph Robert Bernard. 1966. Le Naturaliste Canadien 93(4): 433.Good, Ronald d'Oyley. 1927. Journal of the Linnean Society, Botany 47(317): 519.Cronquist, Arthur John. 1991. Manual of the Vascular Plants of Northeastern United States and Adjacent Canada (ed. 2) 864.Evergreen Native Plant Database
Taxonomy All the United States and some of the Canadian material belongs to E. eamesii subsp. atropurpureum (Fernald & Wiegand) D.Löve, which has been regarded as a separate species by some authorities but not others.USDA Natural Resources Conservation Service, Plants profile, Empetrum eamesii
Distribution and habitat It is native to eastern Canada and the northeastern US. It has been reported from sand dunes, rocky outcrops, and alpine heath in Québec, Nova Scotia, Prince Edward Island, Maine, New Hampshire, Vermont, New York State, the Upper Peninsula of Michigan, Minnesota (Cook County), Newfoundland and Labrador and Saint Pierre and Miquelon.
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