Q:
I have several of these trees growing in my yard. They are volunteers, meaning they just grew up on their own. I live in the Pacific Northwest (Western Washington near Puget Sound). New ones grow up around the largest tree. They have some white flowers in the spring and the fruit shown in one of the pictures is about the size of a jumbo olive and olive shaped or plum shaped.
The foliage is green to maroon. They are pretty trees, seem to come from one root. These have volunteered in my vegetable garden where I use compost.
Does anyone know what kind of tree it is?
Susan from ThriftyFun
A: Susan,
What a gorgeous tree. How tall is it? At first glance it looks like an ornamental plumb tree to me. I would advise taking a small branch bearing a fruit to a nearby nursery for identification. I have a similar looking tree in my yard (only with maroon bark) that produces tiny sour crab apples. I have never had it identified. The apples are too small and sour for eating, but the area wildlife seems to love them! Try this website to help narrow down your search-http://www.plant-care.com/1565-fine-flowering-fruit-trees-guide.html
Ellen
About The Author: Ellen Brown is our Green Living and Gardening Expert. Click here to ask Ellen a question! Ellen Brown is an environmental writer and photographer and the owner of Sustainable Media, an environmental media company that specializes in helping businesses and organizations promote eco-friendly products and services. Contact her on the web at http://www.sustainable-media.com
I would be leery of eating something unidentified, growing in my backyard, I would take a sample of branch, leaf and flower or fruit to a nursery and find out for sure what it was.
if it is one of those "small plum" trees, lucky you. We have some branches of a neighbors' tree that grow on our side of the fence and in late summer they are sweet as candy.
(sent in by email) The tree is a Jujube, an edible fruit. It comes from the buckthorn family and it is one of the Asian tree. I have some in New Mexico and they are wonderful eating.
I'm not sure whether or not the fruit is edible. I've squished into a few of them with my fingernail and there is some juice inside. They don't have a pit like a cherry, the flesh was kind of pinky tan colored but I haven't tried to eat one, for one thing, I'm not sure what it is or when it is ripe. It will be flowering soon and i'll try to get a picture when it flowers. They do look like a cherry plum, they are not a lot larger than cherries but oval shaped. Might be some kind of ornamental flowering plum.
I've looked around online and haven't found any foliage like this to identify the tree. Thanks for all the input, Susan
I get free seedlings that come up from my compost all the time too, both vegetables and fruit trees. I've gotten several fruit trees, but never plum. I'm green with envy--consider yourself lucky!
I have only lived here since end of August, so I am still taking notes of what is going on with trees/plantings. A bird may have planted (haha) the seedlings, or may have been from what you have eaten at one time. I'll keep you posted this spring as to what I observe on mine.
Yummy, looks like plums! When did the fruit ripen? Are the pits oval shaped? My landlords' planted some in the front of our house, and I am always finding little sprouts (I give them to our neighbor) They are a slim tree and our fruit ripened in July. We are South of Portland OR, and have A LOT of moss...and still need to prune, but I got to try the last of the plums and were DELICIOUS We get a lot of western and Sterlings Blue Jays eeating them!
Login using the form on the top of the page to post feedback (if you are a registered user). If you have not yet registered, click here to do so. It's FREE!.
