It’s a common ornamental shrub, but Google seems to think it’s edible and the leaves are used in herbal teas. It’s supposed to be pretty drought tolerant.
Have you ever eaten it? If so, what was the taste like? What is it like to grow it?
Barely an edible. Part of the Honeysuckle Family. PFAF says leafs are eaten in times of famine, when all else fails. Many Species, most barely edible if at all.
Not sure which species you have & it probably doesn’t matter either as they probably all are equally barely edible & not worth your time.
That being said, are they graft compatible with edible Honeysuckles?
In exploring marginally edible shrubs, I would personally prioritize native shrubs, as they will provide more ecological services for the same space.
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Thank you both! 
I don’t have one, but I was eyeing one at a plant nursery website recently and wondering if it would be worth getting one to try eating. It sounds like it’s probably not worth trying! 
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ooh Interesting, marginally edible shrubs? What kinds have you found out so far? They may be something I already forage for 
Yea, Life is short. Focus breeding efforts on what you love. Corn was also at first just a marginally edible plant & now it’s basically all we grow 
. I’m sure the same thing can be repeated with other marginally edible plants like the Abandoned sump weed (Iva annua). Historically it was cultivated by Native Americans as a seed crop, it was probably abandoned for corn. I’m sure the same thing will happen to all of our other landrace crops if no one maintains them.
Where i live, examples would be blackhaw viburnum, arrow wood viburnum, wild American hazelnut and American plum. In my experience there’s a major difference between “edible” and subsistence-quality… wild hazelnuts being edible but a lot of work for what you get, and plums being also a lot of work compared to calories gained. Admittedly I don’t have the cultural knowledge to be fully efficient in gathering and processing. Landracing would probably improve yields of both plants.
Oh I thought you mean even more Marginally edible . I was legit thinking of things on the border between edibility or not, like that kind of marginal. American Plum & American Hazelnut are excellent Wild Edibles to forage for, much better than weigela.
I also know have too much experience with hazelnuts as I’ve never found them or the american plum from all my time foraging. I’m sure American Plum is FAR more productive than American Bird Cherry (Prunus serotina) and yet it’s a popular foraging tree.
I’m not sure how much better American Hazelnut is compared to the other speices but breeding work has been done on Hazelnuts to improve what ever the wild ones lacked. I remember Forager Samuel Thayer talking about 2 American Hazelnut species, both were decent & worth foraging for, but I don’t know how his experience compares to domesticated hazelnuts & if they are easier to gather.
Agreed! Also provide good disease resistance to their domesticated counterparts. Either way, they make excellent Graft trees to graft better varieties on to which can help breeding efforts as well.