Hi everyone, I’m trying to figure out what type of plum used to be in my childhood house’s backyard, and I was able to find pictures that match my memory.
When I reverse search these photos, the search results just say “sugar plum”, but as far as I understand this is a generic term that doesn’t refer to a specific varietal. I also thought it might be a French Plum / Plum d’Agen, but that plum seems to turn completely purple when ripe whereas I distinctly remember my childhood plum being a combination of purple and yellow-green, even when ripe. Please help!!
In the store what I have seen labeled as sugar plum look like the Italian prune plums in shape. Those labeled sugar ones had the purple-yellow skin like your pic. These are the smaller ‘egg’ shape ones. What shape and size were the ones from your childhood?
My guess would be Opal plum. Opal is a good quality European plum, that ripens earlier than most other Euro varieties. It does not turn the dark purple color of most Euro prune plum types when ripe.
only problem is i feel like this wouldnt get enough chill hours in bay area? a quick seach says French Improved and Muir Beauty both of which look about right
seems like it has the rightish color at least sometimes
This would’ve been in the 2000-2010 range. Plum tree was definitely old and “sick”, in fact it succumbed to the sickness probably 5 or so years ago. It had what looked like slightly bluish white fungus or mold growing on it.
hm, maybe french improved is right, its been in the u.s. since like the 1900s i think. Also i feel like youve implied it was the only plum around, and i think its self fertile.
