Bullace? Cherry Plum? Other?

[wonkothesane]

I think this is my first post, which makes me realise I should go and introduce myself, since I've been lurking for a while.

I noticed a smallish tree at the in-laws' a couple of weeks ago that was growing through their fence. At the time I thought is was blackthorn due to the dark bark and spiny protuberances that snagged me.

Selling it as a favour to remove a nuisance, I offered to take it out to save further damage to the fence. Naturally I had plans for the wood (spoons and sundry).

However, when I came to remove it, I found hard green fruits much too large to be sloes.

I found one fruit that had started to get some pinky/red blush on it and cut it open to check it was really a plum. Despite being very firm, I tasted it and it was surprisingly sweet and tangy so I ate the whole thing. All the others I noticed were still completely green.

Immediately after cutting, the thickest part of the trunk was somewhat orangey, which has darkened considerably since (unpictured):

I'm not a great botanist but also don't like to be pointed at http://lmgtfy.com so I did a certain amount of due diligence and came up with two possibilities. I assumed it was some kind of Prunus, and initially thought it was White or Golden Bullace (the fruit look very much like the ones pictures on https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bullace) but then it specifically says "distinguishable from the sloe by its broader leaves and small number or complete absence of spines." and there were a reasonable number of spines.

Alternatively, I thought it could be a Cherry Plum (Prunus cerasifera) but the fruits of that tree look too red when ripe.

I'm not entirely sure why it matters so much to me, since my main interest in it is the wood; which looks like it should be very nice to carve. Just inherently a bit retentive, I suppose.

Thanks in advance for looking.

 

[Macaroon]

That's what we call a Mirabelle in these parts, and ours come in both yellow and red varieties, they're at exactly the same stage as that which you show just now. Prunus is a really strange one to I.D., as different parts of the UK have different names for the likes of these, Bullace especially is a nightmare as every part of the country seems to have it's own definition for the name. The other thing is that Prunus will readily hybridise, and does so regularly so you see all sorts of crosses that aren't in the books and then you never see them again.

But they're all delicious in one form or another and good for you as well

 

[santaman2000]

..... Prunus is a really strange one to I.D., as different parts of the UK have different names for the likes of these, Bullace especially is a nightmare as every part of the country seems to have it's own definition for the name.....

Not any better here. we tend to use the words Bullace, Scuppernong, and Muscadine interchangeably depending on region or even from one family to another.

The tree pictured looks a lot like our cherry trees. When a bit bigger than pictured they make great fence posts.

 

[Robson Valley]

To me, the horizontal, brownish lenticels on the outer bark surface mean Prunus sp. (plums & cherries).
Very appetizing plum to see, as well. I guess no more fruit, huh?
Forgive me: Looking at the wood pile, my first thought was to wonder how many BBQ loads of smoke wood I could expect from that!

 

[daveO]

The fruit looks a bit like green guage to me, they tend to be a bit rounder than plums.

 

[Tengu]

Some sort of decorative but still edible plum family?

Where my home is the council have planted loads and the fruit are all colours.

 

[Giantwalks]

In Germany we call it "Renekloden" (lat.: Prunus domestica subsp. italica) (engl.: greengage) like here:
http://www.lestra.de/essen-und-trinken/warenkunde/pflaumenkunde/

 

[Leshy]

+1 for green gage

 

[Giantwalks]

Unfortunately you cuted it. In Germany you would get about 800 Euro for such a little tree because they are really rare.
For the last one (5 meters tall) I had to buy for one of my customers I payed 2,300 euro.

 

[mrcharly]

Unfortunately you cuted it. In Germany you would get about 800 Euro for such a little tree because they are really rare.
For the last one (5 meters tall) I had to buy for one of my customers I payed 2,300 euro.

Rare?
They are a not-uncommonly grown small fruit tree in the UK. Not expensive to buy.
http://www.orangepippintrees.co.uk/plum-trees/old-greengage

 

[Giantwalks]

Rare?
They are a not-uncommonly grown small fruit tree in the UK. Not expensive to buy.
http://www.orangepippintrees.co.uk/plum-trees/old-greengage

In Germany and Danmark they are very rare because of an infection some years ago. We lost about 86 % of the whole population. That´s why they are so expensive here.

 

[mrcharly]

Gosh - that's awful.
Are there restrictions on importing them?

 

[Giantwalks]

Gosh - that's awful.
Are there restrictions on importing them?

No, there are no restrictions, but the imported plant would survive about a year, maybe two, and then it will die because plants normally need about 4-5 years to get a resistence against some infections. It´s a huge problem worldwide because each and every day thousands of new breedings apear on planet earth. Some are good, some defenitely not. It´s all about consuming alot and quick. The banana is such a plant. On planet earth you wont find a natural banana anymore. Maybe in the rainforest. But all the bananas you can buy are genetically engineered because of one tiny virus. That´s the reason for the existence of the Laboratory of tropical crop improvement in Leuven/Belgium. There they have seeds of all banana-sorts worldwide. Whenever the virus destroyed a plantain, the farmers take a new banana-sort from Leuven. (fu... I have to improve my english)

 

[mrcharly]

I will plant some green gauges here, to increase the number of mature trees, just to balance things out.

 

[Ferret75]

My brother has a similar tree growing at his new home, but it appears to be a commercial type as it looks to be grafted to a rootstock. The fruits are of a similar size shape and green colour at the moment and they are in tight clusters close to the branch grouped around the spurs. Some branches have pseudo spines with some similarities to sloes, but no-where near as vicious! They don't hang like a damson does and are much rounder with a large stone at the centre. As someone mentioned above, we think it's a hybrid, especially as some of the older gardens nearby have both damson and plum trees in them... We're patiently waiting for the mystery fruit to ripen so we can 'test' them... all in the name of investigative botany, obviously!!


Sent from my Nexus 7 using Tapatalk

 

[badoosh]

Looks like a cherry plum,loads near me the building company planted when they built new houses. They come in all shapes,sizes and colours and white blossom early on in the year. Make nice jam. I cut a few sticks from them and the wood seemed to have a red tinge to it.

 

[Nice65]

Looks like a cherry plum,loads near me the building company planted when they built new houses. They come in all shapes,sizes and colours and white blossom early on in the year. Make nice jam. I cut a few sticks from them and the wood seemed to have a red tinge to it.

The purple leaved varieties can have a very pink tinge to the wood. They're everywhere round here and I also call them Mirabelle plums, though a true Mirabelle is yellow. They make excellent eating, and are closely related to the greengage.