Still lots of red fruit on Cotoneaster frigidus here. But it isn't zone 5 hardy.

Resin

i may be wrong...

but fruit is not universally edible...

some needs to be frosted..

some needs to be frozen ..

and some needs to come all they way out the other side of winter... be for its good to eat ...

so ... for an ID ... a leaf.. a stem.. the trunk .. pix of any will help ...

and possibly .. if your winter was as bad as mine on this side of the state ... more birds were smart enough to go farther south this winter ... based on 45 days of single digits ...

maybe i dreamed it .... lol ...

ken

PS: and dont forget those that ferment first..

I'll try to get a picture taken sometime this weekend.

Red Jade probably doesn't belong in the list your local nursery gave you - it has weeping form and red fruit, but not very persistent. They may have meant to say Red Jewel, which is one of the best for persistent red fruit.

Would crabapples still be on the tree at this point? I speak with zone 7 ignorance, but it seems birds or cold would have zapped the fruit in some way. Could they be a deciduous holly?...how large are the berries?

I agree with arbordave's edit, and with alicate's nursery advice. There are certainly many more persistent-fruited crabapples for the upper Midwest landscape, but those listed are fine forms.

I doubt that most deciduous hollies would be mistaken for trees (esp. Winterberries), though Possumhaw hollies (Ilex decidua) can be grown that way. They'd never be considered "many" in the landscape though, and I wonder if they are planted very much or at all in Michigan.

Look up the Father Fiala selections of crabapples for a new take on what is possible across the growing conditions in northern OH, IN, IL and southern MI/WI.

To mbuckmaster:

We still have plenty of crabapples on our tree out front. The Robins have been feasting on them.