(36 votes, average: 3.75 out of 5)
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Bilberry
Edible 
Summer
Bilberries are very hard to gather in large amounts, not due to their size or quantity but because they taste so good we haven’t managed to leave a Bilberry spot without all our pickings being eaten and, it appears smeared all over our faces and hands.
| Hedgerow Type | |
| Common Names | Bilberry, Blaeberry, Whortleberry, Whinberry, Windberry, Myrtle Berry |
| Scientific Name | Vaccinium myrtillus |
| Season Start | Jul |
| Season End | Sep |
Leaves
Small, ovate, shiny green slightly toothed leaves, often red or with red areas.
Flowers
Has tiny delicate pink/red flowers looking a bit like small, hollow, unripe berries.
Fruit
The berries are very dark blue, almost black with a white ‘bloom’ that can make them appear lighter. There is often the remains of the flower surrounding a tiny ‘cog wheel’ on the end of the berry.
Habitat
Heaths, moors and some woodland, the Bilberry prefers acid rich, nutrient poor soil.
Possible Confusion
When the berries are out, combined with the leaf shape, it is difficult to confuse this plant with other heathland species.
Taste
Wonderful, like blueberries but with a deeper, richer flavour.
Frequency
Fairly common in acid rich woodland.
Collecting
It is traditional to start collecting Bilberries on the last Sunday in July or the first Sunday in August, depending where you are in the UK.
Medicinal Uses
There are reports of the RAF using Bilberries to help with night vision during bombing raids but this appears to be a story linked to carrots which were said to be used by the RAF in an attempt to conceal the fact Britain had radar. That said Bilberries have been used for different eye treatments through the ages.
The plant has also been used to treat chronic fatigue, gout, hemorrhoids, diabetes, urinary tract infections and osteoarthritis.
37 comments for Bilberry
Love Bilberries so much nicer than Blueberries…they are a faff to pick but get the kids into it and it’s just fun and if you have any left a bilberry tart is to die for…I’m salivating! Bring on the harvest!
Where do you find them? As a child in the 50s we always had them but they’re like gold dust now, my greengrocer has t seen any for over 2 years!
Hi Pam, they are quite common but it is usually hard to spot your first berry as they hide among the leaves. they can be found on heaths, moors and some woodland and prefers acid rich, nutrient poor soil. Eric.
Recipes please for windberries ???
Hi Jane, we are always looking for new recipes but with Bilberries I can never leave the woods with any apart from what I’ve eaten which is all of them. Eric.
My childhood memory from the 60’s is windberry (wimbrey) pie with custard or cream. Very simple to make with shortcrust pastry and eating just warm… Heavenly!
Grew up eating teas of bilberry jam on cutrounds with clotted cream – all homemade by Mother. Non-Westcountry family would especially ask for this when visiting during the season – having helped us go out to gather them on Exmoor for more jam and pie making later. 🙂
Windberry tart is one of my childhood favourites.
How this takes me back to my childhood almost 60 years ago and picking these with my Nan in Dudley on the Old Park (now a large housing estate) in the 1950’s. Then it was the place we went to pick dandelions, elderberries, blackberries and all the natural stuff that grew and was turned into wines, puddings, pies etc throughout the summer and autumn . Nan used to preserve stuff in big jars down in the cellar and in china barrels painted with flower decorations which sat upon the shelves. There were partridges & lots of other wild birds about on the Old Park which stretched for miles from behind Wellington Road down towards Pensnett and Gornal and occasional signs warning of “Underground Fire” which were scary. I never understood what it was. My Nan was a wonderful cook and I can remember the lovely taste of bilberry pie and how it stained everything it touched a purply blue colour. It was a so much nicer taste than the taste of blueberries and had a unique flavour. Happy times when food and everything else was more natural and we were so much more content with what we had. If only I had a time machine …….!
There are by brinham rocks, by Leeds Bradford airport, but exactly where, I don’t know as people keep it secret, lots by airport apparently, loads , buckets full.
Been to ilkley moor today where there used to be good pickings (bilberries have always been hit and miss) unfortunately the bracken doesn’t seem to be controlled anymore, so it was very slim pickings, looks like the sheep had cropped the few bushes we found. Got about 100g of small and quite possibly sour berries, which is a bit rubbish. Might have a go a blubberhouses and motley chevron soon.
We used to pick these as small children in the early 70’s on the North Yorkshire moors.
My sister now lives in the Shropshire hills and they call them whinberries.
I’m off to Somerset next week where apparently they call them by the lovely name of whortleberries. I fear it will be too early in the year to sample them might just have to buy some jam instead
I was picking ripe bilberries on Dartmoor on the 29th June this year so you should find some in Somerset.
Heading to Dartmore from Kingsbridge for a look and a pick this week.
It’ll be my first time and not sure where to start. Was thinking around the Avon Dam? Any advice?
You should be able to find Bilberries all over Dartmoor, the hardest thing is spotting your first berry, not every plant is covered in them so you have to hunt about a little. It’s a long way from Avon Dam but I know there are lots on the hillside behind the Warren House Inn on the Postbridge road.
Forty years back I used to buy bilberries in jars from Morrisons. Now cannot find any anywhere, only as food supplements as extract, tincture etc. and enormously expensive at that! But they grow wild near where I live, so will be out picking very early….
Hello people , pls,pls,pls send some more info about where to go to pick them up , as I live near london it is nothing aroun and I would lobe to pick some for me and my family, bilberrys ar my childhood fantastic memories, we just poped in to the wood behind my uncle house and have most amazing time , just add sugar in a cup and mixed them all together, best treat ever
Thanks for any info
I had an idyllic afternoon last week with my daughter, picking them on the moors on the edge of Derbyshire, near Glossop. I’m eating some right now, just a good handful on top of my toast. They roll off & drop on the floor & i have to save every one, because they take a long time to pick! Daughter is freezing hers & using them for my 60th birthday cake in September.
Does anyone know if there are any places in Norfolk where Bilberries grow? I am from North Yorkshire and grew up picking and eating every year. I really miss them and Blueberries just don’t cut it.
My husband and I have just spent a lovely anniversary taking in the views of North Yorkshire Moors which has been topped off by bilberry picking.
First time I’ve done it since childhood.
My husband is originally from Manchester and calls them Win-berries.
Lovely day! Yorkshire is Gods country.
Oh echo’s of my youth when you could buy them off a cart in the street. Anyone who says they are just small blueberries has never had a bilberry pie. They are to die for.
Picking bilberries here in West Yorkshire last weekend, 26th & 27th September. Not known them as late as this before. Global warming?
Went to Sutton Bank yesterday, surprised to find bilberries on top. Not the best specimen, but enough to make a couple of crumbles. Delicious with custard. 😋
I have a large wild garden of heather and rough grass situated on a steep hillside at about 1,000 feet up on the edge of the Pennines in Shepley, West Yorkshire. In July/August we had the usual abundant crop of bilberries, followed by a bumper crop of blackberries in September. But this year, 2020, for the first time in my memory we have had a second, delicious crop of bilberries right now in mid-November!! So what’s happening? Is it global warming (as Simon says, 3rd October) or what else? An answer from one of the professionals somewhere would be helpful . . . . 😊
My father was a wholesaler in Smithfield Market in Manchester before the war and used to import large quantities of bilberry. We ate plenty at home (especially in pies), but picking one’s own on the moors was never very productiive. All imports were from Poland and he bought them on the docks in Hull, but also much from Covent Garden as they were pretty much unknown in the South and all the those imported into London were sent straight to Manchester and other northern cities. It is only latterly that “Blueberries” have become fashionable (one suspects under American influences) in this country. Personally, I buy frozen “blueberries” imported from European countries: they freeze very well and taste as good as “fresh” (imported) ones on the market, but not quite like my old time “Bilberries”. Unfortunately, I am too far past my prime to search the moors “up North”.
Do you know where I can buy the frozen ones? I live in Reading Berks. I haven’t had bilberries for years.
Farm Foods frozen food shops
In Poland and I suspect Germany and Scandinavian countries you can buy them in markets,
Once COVID over you could go on hols, and feast,
I pick loads, freeze them and make jam too, have in porridge, gosh is it nice.
Gatero if u play last day on earth, game.
Just found loads of bilberrries on Bodmin moor
Years ago I used to pick them on the lickey hills near Birmingham
Mega year for bilberries on the moors in the North of England. I’ve got 20lbs in my freezer and I could pick the same again 10 times over on my patch.
Just been to Sunnyside in Coquetdale and the woods are full of the things! Unfortunately, I didn’t know what they were until I got home and checked – could kick myself! I picked a sprig to help with identification which just happened to have about half a dozen berries on it, everyone is correct – they are lovely! Maybe go back next week and pick up a bucket load or two 😁.
There are bilberry bushes covering huge portions of the ground in Padley Gorge in the Peak Districts/ Derbyshire. I spotted them in the woods last week, too early to have started fruiting yet but it looks like there should be tons once they get going!
I loved Billberry picking and eating them and in jam. I really Junemiss them we don’t get get them here in New Zealand
Strange that Billberry a local fruit with enormous proven benefits has been totally sidelined and deliberately ignored due to the overpowering promotion of the American Blueberry.
The pilots of the war planes fighting in the Battle of Britain were all given Billberry to make their eyesight as well as their reactions much sharper.
I urge every one in the UK to do all that they can to expand the planting and harvesting of this amazing, native to UK fruit, as well as find the best ways to increase the distribution of Billberry.
Lots of places in the Staffordshire Moorlands. Anywhere over about 600ft on acidic soils, Moors and light woodland. We start with a small pie for a light pick then jam for a bit more then wine when it’s the jackpot!
Also look for purple bird poo then you will probably find bilberries.
I went into a shop in Richards Castle Shropshire a few years ago and could smell the lovely aroma of bilberries. Someone came in which a fresh box of them which they had picked locally,
we used to collect them on the moors by Holmfirth and Greenfield. If we managed to get them home safely mum made the most gorgeous Wimberry pies. they have a different texture as well as taste to blackcurrants…the juice seemed to be thicker….also made your tongue go black so you couldn’t pinch any without anyone knowing. That would be in the late 1940s and 50s.