Wild Cherry

Prunus avium

Rose family (Rosaceae)

Origin: Europe

Description: Tree up to 30m high. Bark grey or brown, often peeling in strips to reveal shiny reddish or purplish-brown colour beneath. Leaves alternate, oval to oblong or widest above the middle and pointed, margins with rounded teeth, hairy in the vein axils beneath. Flowers 3-4cm across, shallowly cup-shaped, usually white, in clusters of 2-6 with the hairless stalks all arising from a central point. Ripe fruit 9-12mm long, yellow, red or black and either sweet or sour.

Comments: The sweet or dessert cherries belong to this species. Morellos, the sour or cooking cherries, belong to the related Prunus cerasus. Double-flowered forms of wild cherry are often planted as ornamental trees; these do not produce fruit.

Similar trees:

• Spring cherry
• Cherry-plum