Nanjing cherry seeds

Nanjing cherry / Prunus tomentosa - a species of cherry, now attributed to the genus Plum (Prunus). Is a shrub, usually with several trunks 1.5-2.5 m high, rarely up to 3 m and higher. The leaves are dark green, oval, pubescent below, strongly corrugated, with a pointed end. The flowers are white, white with pink (rarely pink), up to 2.5 cm in diameter.

Common names for Prunus tomentosa include Nanjing cherry, Korean cherry, Manchu cherry, downy cherry, Shanghai cherry, Ando cherry, mountain cherry, Chinese bush cherry, and Chinese dwarf cherry.

Nanjing cherry is native to China, Korea and Mongolia, where it grows wild. However, as a culture, it has become widespread since the middle of the 20th century in the gardens of the temperate zone of Europe and North America.

Nanjing cherry fruits are oval drupes, red when ripe, sweet (sometimes sour) in taste, smaller than common cherries (0.8-1.5 cm in diameter), covered with a small fluff. Depending on the region, ripen from late June to late July; fructifies abundantly, usually in the third year and up to 15-20 years annually.

In gardens, Nanjing cherry is often grown as an ornamental crop, although its fruits are edible and are not inferior in taste to other cherries, and up to 12 kg of berries are harvested from one bush, sometimes up to 15 kg.

Nanjing cherry is unpretentious to soils, but prefers sunny places. In the shade and in rainy weather during the ripening period, the berries rot on the branch. Ripe berries practically do not crumble, and dried ones are sometimes on the branches until spring. Much more frost-resistant than other types of cherries, but also does not tolerate cold during flowering. Unlike other types of cherries, it is very resistant to coccomycosis.

Nanjing cherry is self-fertile, although there are both female and male flowers on the same bush. For this reason, gardeners grow 3-5 shrubs nearby. It also gives a lot of shoots (“tops”), which are convenient to seat, but you need to make sure that it does not spoil the appearance of the garden.

The fruits contain a large amount of sugars (8-10%), mainly glucose and fructose, as well as malic and citric acids (0.8-1.2%), vitamin C (16-32 mg%), pectins and tannins.