I've planted amelanchier stolonifera in a dry, sunny, native plant garden at a local school in N.J.. The garden did sit in the middle of a moderately sloping
front lawn. After the first year it received no supplemental watering . The shrub did well on this open dry site. It was lovely in bloom. Unfortunately the garden sucumbed to the "too messy in our front yard" crowd. I did save the amelanchier and some of the grasses.
Pixie

Thanks Pixie! It's good to hear that the serviceberry was successful in that location. Were there any other berry bushes that did well in that garden?

lizzyvann,
The only other berrying shrubs we tried were blueberry and creeping cranberry. Neither survived. We thought since the soil was heavy clay enriched with compost it would be wet enough but we were unlucky and it was a dry spring and summer and watering was difficult. We might have been more successful with lowbush blueberry.
I have a Virginiana Rose that will take a dry sunny site and produces a good crop of rose hips each year that are supposed to be wildlife friendly but have yet to see any creature eat them. The rose does form a nice thicket, fragrant pink flowers in June, and young stems are a lovely red all winter.
Have you looked at the book "Native Plants of the Northeast" by Donald J. Leopold ? Both Cornus racemosa and Cornus rugosa along with
Vibernum acerifolium are listed as tolerating dry sites. Maybe someone has
personal experience with any of these. I'm going to try the Viburnum in a shady garden.
Pixie

Thanks again for the info Pixie! That viburnum does sound pretty good. I haven't heard of that book before--my library doesn't have it. I already have 4 rugosa roses growing along the far edge of the slope--great rose hips, but no wildlife takers for me either. I wonder if the hips are too big?? Another question about the amelanchier for you, if you don't mind...was it filling in well? What I'm wondering is if it will make a good dense groundcover.
Lizzy

Hi lizzyvan,
The serviceberry grew about 3 ft. tall and 3 ft. wide in about 5 years. It had heavy competition from grasses, Switch and Indian, Eupatorium rugosum (Chocolate,this plant spreads too aggresively for my taste), ironweed, penstemon Husker Red, black eyed susan, goldenrod,echinacea, etc.
William Cullina in 'Native Trees, Shrubs & Vines' refers to Amelancheir stolonifera as having a " low scraggly habit...but could be used where a drought-tolerant spreading groundcover is needed...it spreads at the same rate as lowbush blueberry, making it a good companion "(pg 45). Our serviceberry was more of a full bush, I assume because of the competition from the surrounding plantings.
The Virginiana rose has small rose hips.
Pixie