Editing Shepherdia argentea (section)

== Fruit and uses ==

[[File:YellowOrangeBuffaloberrySK.JPG|300px|Buffaloberry fruit showing orange-yellow color, Saskatoon, Saskatchewan]]

The berry is edible but sour when eaten raw and is best known cooked into jams, jellies, pies and sauces.<sup>[[#cite_note-4|[4]]]</sup><sup>[[#cite_note-3|[3]]]</sup> Plains peoples and early settlers preserved the fruit, which was also made into a sauce served with bison meat; buffaloberry wine has recently become commercially available in the United States.<sup>[[#cite_note-3|[3]]]</sup><sup>[[#cite_note-2|[2]]]</sup><sup id="cite_ref-11">[[#cite_note-11|[11]]]</sup>

Chemical work on wild Great Plains and Saskatchewan fruit shows a tart, very sweet berry: about 21 °Brix soluble solids with about 2.2 percent titratable acidity and 28 percent dry matter, and 209 ± 37 mg ascorbic acid per 100 g fresh weight in the Saskatchewan sample.<sup>[[#cite_note-11|[11]]]</sup><sup>[[#cite_note-5|[5]]]</sup> The red color is carotenoid-based, coming almost entirely from two pigments of similar abundance — lycopene (mean 0.267 g/kg fresh weight, 0.18–0.36 across the sampled selections) and methyl-apo-6'-lycopenoate — with only traces of other carotenoids.<sup>[[#cite_note-11|[11]]]</sup> Dried berries are hygroscopic and stay soft like raisins.<sup>[[#cite_note-11|[11]]]</sup>

The USDA NRCS plant guide cautions that the berries contain saponin, which can cause irritation of the digestive system, while small amounts can be consumed with little risk.<sup>[[#cite_note-3|[3]]]</sup>

One grower in a zone 3B semi-arid, high-wind district reports that buffaloberry is among the hardiest shrubs that establish and grow without much assistance, and that the native thorned fruit bushes are best placed in low-lying, sheltered ground; the same grower had heard that preserves can be made from most of these bushes but had not tried it himself.<sup id="cite_ref-12">[[#cite_note-12|[12]]]</sup>