Prunus avium seed

LATIN NAME: PRUNUS AVIUM

COMMON NAME: Wild Sweet Cherry

The wild sweet cherry straightens the tall, deciduous tree with the smooth, grey-brown, banded bark and the oval, toothed, dark-green leaves, the clusters of the white flowers opening with the leaves in the spring, the small, dark-red to near-black, sweet cherries following, the tree holding the broad, open crown. It grows quickly into the tall, spreading form, and it stands the cold winters well. It likes the sun, and the deep, fertile, well-drained soil.

Scientific Research & Plant Biotechnology

The wild sweet cherry has a long paper trail in the studies of the stone-fruit breeding and the cherry rootstocks, and the avium species appears in the work on the sweet cherry cultivars and the forest-edge bird dispersal. The research looks at the way the open crown carries the heavy fruit loads, the bird-carried stones, and the seed biology. The pomologists keep the rootstock value in view, and the growers of the orchards and the forest trees list the cherry in their catalogues.

Ecological & Economic Value & Wide Applications

In the wild wood, the wild sweet cherry raises the white blossom canopy high over the spring floor. The dark cherries feed the birds, the blossom feeds the bees, and the tree makes the fine orchard, the timber tree and the woodland ornamental. It thrives in the deep, fertile, open ground. White-canopied, dark-fruited and woodland-born.

To grow the Wild Sweet Cherry from seed, chill the stones in damp sand before planting them.

Chill the stones in damp sand before planting them, and keep the young trees in the open, sunny spot. The white blossom comes with the spring. in pots of loamy compost, keep the pots lightly watered, and the young trees wake as the soil warms. The white blossom comes with the spring.

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Wild cherry (Prunus avium) is thought to be the most ornamental of our native broadleaf woodland trees.
It is native throughout the UK and Europe, except the far north. The second part of its botanical name – ‘avium’ refers to birds, which eat the cherries and disperse the seed. In Scotland, cherry is sometimes referred to as ‘gean’.

Mature trees can grow to 30m and live for up to 60 years. The shiny bark is a deep reddish-brown with prominent cream-coloured horizontal lines. The green leaves are oval and toothed with pointed tips. They fade to orange and deep crimson in autumn.
Cherry trees are hermaphrodite, meaning the male and female reproductive parts are found in the same flower, in April. Flowers are white and cup-shaped, they hang in clusters of two to six.

After pollination by insects, the flowers develop into globular, hairless deep red cherries.

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