North American Fruit Explorers mailing list at ibiblio

[Claude Jolicoeur <cjoli@gmc.ulaval.ca>]

A 09:30 09.11.18 -0500, vous avez écrit :
>Claude and Doug,
>
>I know sometimes nurseries are very lax about naming.  Here around the 
>Montreal region, there are many nurseries selling a "Mirabelle" plum, the 
>cultivar itself not being specified. Most of the nurseries list it as Ag Can 
>Z4, so suitable for my region.

The "Mirabelle" I have probably doesn't have a cultivar name. It has been
propagated by root suckers and possibly originally came from a seedling -
who knows? This is often the case with old varieties - there is a lot of
variation. Check if the nurseries Mirabelles are grafted, if not, it means
it is root propagated, which I think is better because then you get some
root suckers that you can replant elsewhere or give to friends!

>
>In late summer we have a lot of farmer's markets and supermarkets selling 
>baskets of small juicy yellow plums flushed with orange red from Ontario.  I 
>always assumed they are a Mirabelle type, or they could be Reine Claudes I 
>suppose. Fully ripe, I find them a particularly tasty treat. Hopefully my 
>tree will produce similar fruit.

No they are not Mirabelles - they are either Early Golden or Shiro, both
are japanese plums, another species. Mirabelles are quite smaller than
that, and Reine-Claude are greener.

Claude