I have some young trees I planted in pots a couple of years ago as seeds.

I am fairly sure they are either cornelian cherry (cornus mas), or cherry
plum (prunus cerasifera). But I can't remember which, and I've lost the
label and the packet!

Anyone able to suggest how I could tell, given that they are only about 5
inches tall?

They have very slim leaves, smooth and untoothed, tapering to a pointed
tip, and placed alternately along the tiny trunks. Each leaf has a couple
of tiny green spurs at the base of the stalk. Young leaves are a bright
beech green, but quickly darken to a mid to dark green.

The bark, what there is of it on such tiny trees, is brown and smooth.

Any help would be appreciated!


Victoria
--
gardening on a north-facing hill
in South-East Cornwall
--

In .205,
Victoria Clare typed:
..

Any help would be appreciated!



do a google search, click on images and hey presto a variety of images of
the tree in question to compare yours to.

pk

"Paul Kelly" wrote in
:

In .205,
Victoria Clare typed:
.

Any help would be appreciated!



do a google search, click on images and hey presto a variety of images
of the tree in question to compare yours to.

Been there, done that. I didn't find detailed enough images of young
plants rather than mature trees.

Most of the pics of the cherry plum online are of a purple-leaved
varient - there is also a green version, which is what I might have, but
there are fewer images of that.

Hoping someone here might have bought the same Chiltern Seeds pack that
I did, and might recognise my description.

I personally prefer Altavista's image search to Google's for this job,
as I think the quality and relevance of the images returned for
gardening searches is better.

Google is a more text and link-focussed engine, and pays less attention
to filenames and alt text than surrounding content. This tends to
favour images from 'popular' rather than 'expert' sites, in my
experience, which is why you sometimes get a weird mix of random icons
and holiday snaps in with your image lists.

Altavista is less clever in its handling of link popularity, but for
plant images, that's just what you need.

I've tried both in this case, but was unsuccessful.

Victoria
--
gardening on a north-facing hill
in South-East Cornwall
--

Victoria Clare wrote:

"Paul Kelly" wrote in
:

In .205,
Victoria Clare typed:
.

Any help would be appreciated!



do a google search, click on images and hey presto a variety of images
of the tree in question to compare yours to.

Been there, done that. I didn't find detailed enough images of young
plants rather than mature trees.

Most of the pics of the cherry plum online are of a purple-leaved
varient - there is also a green version, which is what I might have, but
there are fewer images of that.

Hoping someone here might have bought the same Chiltern Seeds pack that
I did, and might recognise my description.

I personally prefer Altavista's image search to Google's for this job,
as I think the quality and relevance of the images returned for
gardening searches is better.

Google is a more text and link-focussed engine, and pays less attention
to filenames and alt text than surrounding content. This tends to
favour images from 'popular' rather than 'expert' sites, in my
experience, which is why you sometimes get a weird mix of random icons
and holiday snaps in with your image lists.

Altavista is less clever in its handling of link popularity, but for
plant images, that's just what you need.

I've tried both in this case, but was unsuccessful.

Victoria


Personally I find the botanical image databses more useful with narrowed
searches like this:

Try some of them at:
http://www.science.siu.edu/plant-bio.../BotImages.htm
l

IIRC the Vascular Plant image DB and botanical.com are both pretty good.


As to your original probablem I'm afraid I can't help any further;-(

Try also some of the 'tree' sites as these are more likely to have shoot
images.. Mebbe tree trust publications, Tree ident books, Hilliers Dict
etc. There is a tree catalogue from a german firm that I mentioned here
not so long ago.. 15 Euro for the paperback although looking at
www.lappen.de I see they have an online PDF version. Likely to be a
substantial filesize though.
//
Jim

The message
from Victoria Clare contains these words:

I have some young trees I planted in pots a couple of years ago as seeds.

I am fairly sure they are either cornelian cherry (cornus mas), or cherry
plum (prunus cerasifera). But I can't remember which, and I've lost the
label and the packet!

Anyone able to suggest how I could tell, given that they are only about 5
inches tall?

They have very slim leaves, smooth and untoothed, tapering to a pointed
tip, and placed alternately along the tiny trunks. Each leaf has a couple
of tiny green spurs at the base of the stalk. Young leaves are a bright
beech green, but quickly darken to a mid to dark green.

The bark, what there is of it on such tiny trees, is brown and smooth.

Any help would be appreciated!


I think you have Prunus cerasifera if you're sure it's one or the other.
I have just been to look at the two young trees I have - one of each.
Cornus mas can't be right because the leaves grow in pairs, not
alternately.

Prunus cerasifera has two tiny leaf bits at the base of the stalk (are
they called rachis?) whereas Cornus mas doesn't.

However, my Prunus cerasifera which is about five years old doesn't have
*very* slim leaves and they are definitely toothed. Perhaps comparative
fatness of leaves and serration comes with greater maturity.

Other features of Cornus mas leaves are that they are smooth and
unserrated with conspicuous veins which run parallel to each other
without branching. They run parallel to the edge of the leaf at the top
and almost join again in the centre (hope that makes sense)

Janet G

On Wed, 25 Jun 2003 14:34:09 +0100, Victoria Clare
wrote:

I have some young trees I planted in pots a couple of years ago as seeds.

I am fairly sure they are either cornelian cherry (cornus mas), or cherry
plum (prunus cerasifera). But I can't remember which, and I've lost the
label and the packet!

Your description does fit with them being chery plum. I grew one from
seed and planted it on my allotment about 7 or 8 years ago. It is now
10 feet high and ready to be cut down. I gave it an ultimatum; fruit
this year or else. It was covered in flowers but not a single fruit
set. I assume there is nothing to pollinate it nearby, and I do not
have room for another.
Be aware of this if you nurture them and they do turn out to be cherry
plum.

Pam in Bristol

Pam Moore wrote in
:

On Wed, 25 Jun 2003 14:34:09 +0100, Victoria Clare
wrote:

I have some young trees I planted in pots a couple of years ago as
seeds.

I am fairly sure they are either cornelian cherry (cornus mas), or
cherry plum (prunus cerasifera). But I can't remember which, and I've
lost the label and the packet!

Your description does fit with them being chery plum.


Thanks loads, all. I'm now pretty sure they must be cherry plums, and
cannot be Cornelians. I expect the toothing and fattening of the leaves
will come when they are a bit bigger (if not, I shall have to do some
serious research using Jim's suggestions to find out what on earth I have
planted!)

Pam, I have planted a couple to fill a gap in a hedge, and plan to make the
third a member of my rather overgrown orchard, so I am hopeful that the
three of them will pollinate one another. I also have an almond and a
small forest of what is probably a plum rootstock of some sort.

The latter does not flower much, so perhaps I'll keep the third in a big
pot for a few years, till I see if it is more willing to blossom than the
mystery plum-alike. I am cheered to hear that yours flowered well!

I also have a couple of baby sweet chestnut trees and a cobnut (all grown
from supermarket nuts) that could go in that spot, so it will be a race to
see which grows fastest and looks best.

Victoria (now resolved to stop planting trees from her shopping...)
--
gardening on a north-facing hill
in South-East Cornwall
--

Pam Moore wrote:

On Wed, 25 Jun 2003 14:34:09 +0100, Victoria Clare
wrote:

I have some young trees I planted in pots a couple of years ago as seeds.

I am fairly sure they are either cornelian cherry (cornus mas), or cherry
plum (prunus cerasifera). But I can't remember which, and I've lost the
label and the packet!

Your description does fit with them being chery plum. I grew one from
seed and planted it on my allotment about 7 or 8 years ago. It is now
10 feet high and ready to be cut down. I gave it an ultimatum; fruit
this year or else. It was covered in flowers but not a single fruit
set. I assume there is nothing to pollinate it nearby, and I do not
have room for another.
Be aware of this if you nurture them and they do turn out to be cherry
plum.


Incidentally they can also be pruned/trained into arches/hedges etc..

Most attractive.
//
Jim

"Victoria Clare" wrote in message
.205...
I have some young trees I planted in pots a couple of years ago as seeds.

I am fairly sure they are either cornelian cherry (cornus mas), or cherry
plum (prunus cerasifera). But I can't remember which, and I've lost the
label and the packet!

I planted a whole fat packet of " trees and shrubs" seeds from
Chilterns.Groan !Dave

In article ,
Janet Galpin and Oliver Patterson writes:
|
| However, my Prunus cerasifera which is about five years old doesn't have
| *very* slim leaves and they are definitely toothed. Perhaps comparative
| fatness of leaves and serration comes with greater maturity.

I believe that it is a fairly variable species - it certainly
covers a wide range.

If they are very slim and untoothed, it does sound odd.


Regards,
Nick Maclaren.

could it be red japanese plum? Heather