North American Fruit Explorers mailing list at ibiblio

["Lon J. Rombough" <lonrom@hevanet.com>]

Title: Re: [NAFEX] help ID mystery plum-apricot

That's a pretty typical P. cerasifera, all right.  They are all over the NW.  At one time, they were the main stock for all plums and prunes and anywhere there was ever a plum tree planted that has been neglected, you are apt to find suckers.  Since the rootstocks were grown from seed, there is a fair amount of variation in them.  And the commonly planted red leaf plums are all P. cerasifera, and THEY produce a fair number of normally green seedlings that will have yellow or red blushed yellow fruit.  
    I'd even go so far as to say that most seedling plums I've ever seen in the NW are either P. cerasifera or, much less often, seedlings of Italian.  In the latter case, there have been a fair number of chance Italian seedlings named as new varieties, such as "Brooks".
    Which doesn't mean your find is any less valuable.  I personally feel that P. cerasifera has been overlooked for fruit, when it can actually be quite good, especially for a very early plum.
> -Lon Rombough
>
> I think your ID of Prunus cerasifera is correct.  I found a picture of one type of this that is at this link 
>
> http://www.biopix.dk/Photo.asp?PhotoId=516&Text=1 <http://www.biopix.dk/Photo.asp?PhotoId=516&amp;Text=1> 
>
> Looks just like the fruit I found.  In Denmark they call these Mirabel.  I doubt it is a Burbank plumcot.  You said the two halves would be unequal, while the ones I found are very symmetrical.