In article ,
Roger Tonkin wrote:

Whist out today, we remembered that we had found a few plum trees
growing wild a couple of years ago. Visted them and picked about 4lbs to
make jam. They are quite small, damson size, but not the shape of a
damson and the flesh is quite yellow. Skins vary from red through to
blueish. The trees are a mess, the lower branches being stripped bare by
the cattle and dead wood every where. They are situated around the ruins
of what I think is an old farm cottage which to my knowledge has not
been inhabited (or even had any walls standing) for at least 20 years.

What I wondered was if this might be an old variety of plum that perhaps
is rare, but how do I find out?

With difficulty. Looking at Clapham, Tutin and Warburg, I would
be hard put to tell Prunus domestica from P. cerasifera. The
point is that both are very variable. It doesn't make a lot of
culinary difference. If the fruit are definitely good, it could
be a definite old variety, otherwise it might just be a tree
(grown from a stone) that was good enough to leave alone.

There are about 4 trees, 3 on one side of the ruin and one on the other,
so a stone is not the answer.

Four stones? :-)

More seriously, if they ALL produce fruit that varies from red to
blueish, it could well be a definite variety. However, if the
trees vary between themselves, some kind of casual selection is
more likely. Remember that the fetish for named varieties is
very recent, in cottage garden terms.


Regards,
Nick Maclaren.