See also: jackasheypuck kinnikinik (def. 2) sagakomi (def. 2) squawberry (def. 2)
- 1823  Bear Berry [Arbutus Uva Ursi].
- 1877  The ground was literally covered with bearberries, the uva ursi. . .
- 1958  The willows and the aspens, the currant bushes and the bearberries have encroached upon the town.
2a n. the insipid, red fruit of this shrub, much favored as food by bears.
See also: sagakomi (def. 1)
- 1807  (1889-1890)  The fruits of this solitary region are the poire . . . bearberry, choak-berry. . . .
- 1942  Even the flat-flavored . . . bearberry was not quite beyond praise, for we . . . felt the result of a long tea-and-flour winter.
- 1965  . . . crimson bearberries provide flamboyant contrast to the deep green of the alpine cranberry bushes. . . .
2b n. the fruit of the red-osier dogwood.
See also: red-osier dogwood
- 1820  (1823)  There is also a berry of bluish-white colour, the produce of the white cornel tree, which is named musqua-meena, bear-berry, because these animals are said to fatten on it.
- 1946  Near the water, high-bush cranberries hung in clusters of red brilliance against a background of milk-white bearberries.
2c n. the luscious, black fruit of the Arctostaphylos alpina, a shrub of the Barren Grounds.
- 1952  [We find] some of the tundra's luscious fruits, such as bearberry, Arctic raspberry, and the baked apple.
3 n. the leaf of the bearberry bush, dried and used in making Indian tobacco.
See also: bearberry leaf
- 1927  He filled it with Indian tobacco, known as kinnikinick or bearberry, lighted the calumet of peace with a coal. . . .