Prairie Native Sand Plum harvest

General Fruit Growing
21

My family and friends refere to them as “Sand Hill Plums”.

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22

I have heard that also! Near me there is a big sand hill area, rough native praire pasture where these thrive even on top the dry sand hills where few things grow. I wish more things were as hardy! :slight_smile: they do well in my orchard too which is much better ground suited to apple pear persimmon peach :slight_smile: Ive seen them flooded out too, in the creek floodway, which would kill apple and peach but they did fine.

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23

Can anyone distinguish whether we are talking about Prunus americana or Prunus maritima or something else? I’m in New Mexico and there are wild patches of P. americana, with a wide genetic variation but they are all far tastier than any cultivated plums. I found one patch that had the taste of concord grape! All drought resistant. Still experimenting with late flowering but I’ve seen some patches that flower late enough to bear fruit most years. Not sure how P. maritima might differ. Any observations?

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24

I believe this is ​Prunus angustifolia aka Chickasaw plum, but it goes by many local names including sand plum. P maritima is beach plum (which I brought up, sorry for the confusion)

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Thanks. I’d love to find some comparisons of these different native plums. Anyone found a website that discusses the differences and similarities? Here is a list I found from a different post on this site:

Prunus americana Marshall (subg. Prunus sect. Prunocerasus)
Prunus angustifolia Marshall (subg. Prunus sect. Prunocerasus)
Prunus geniculata R. M. Harper (subg. Prunus sect. Prunocerasus)
Prunus gracilis Engelm. & A. Gray (subg. Prunus sect. Prunocerasus)
Prunus hortulana L. H. Bailey (subg. Prunus sect. Prunocerasus)
Prunus maritima Marshall (subg. Prunus sect. Prunocerasus)
Prunus mexicana S. Watson (subg. Prunus sect. Prunocerasus)
Prunus murrayana E. J. Palmer (subg. Prunus sect. Prunocerasus)
Prunus nigra Aiton (subg. Prunus sect. Prunocerasus)
Prunus ×orthosepala Koehne (subg. Prunus sect. Prunocerasus)
[= P. americana × P. angustifolia; valid publication verified from original literature]
Prunus rivularis Scheele (subg. Prunus sect. Prunocerasus)
Prunus subcordata Benth. (subg. Prunus sect. Prunocerasus)
Prunus umbellata Elliott (subg. Prunus sect. Prunocerasus)

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I dont know, @jcutts , but we have two types here and I thought the taller type was american plum, i could be wrong. And these are called Sand plum or sand hill plum. Those grape flavored ones you found sound very nice!! :slight_smile:

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27

Thanks jcguarneri for the ID (or suggested ID)

wHAT DO THE LEAVES look like more P. angustifolia or P. Americana
Do you kjnow if they are white like Americana
or smaller flowers pinkish from a distance because of pollen (like angustifolia)
and antgustifolia also has redder stems on the leaf it appears on cal photos

https://calphotos.berkeley.edu/cgi/img_query?where-lifeform=any&rel-taxon=contains&where-taxon=Prunus+angustifolia&rel-namesoup=matchphrase&where-namesoup=&rel-location=matchphrase&where-location=&rel-county=eq&where-county=any&rel-state=eq&where-state=any&rel-country=eq&where-country=any&where-collectn=any&rel-photographer=contains&where-photographer=&rel-kwid=equals&where-kwid=&max_rows=24

https://calphotos.berkeley.edu/cgi/img_query?where-lifeform=any&rel-taxon=contains&where-taxon=PRUNUS+AMERICANA&rel-namesoup=matchphrase&where-namesoup=&rel-location=matchphrase&where-location=&rel-county=eq&where-county=any&rel-state=eq&where-state=any&rel-country=eq&where-country=any&where-collectn=any&rel-photographer=contains&where-photographer=&rel-kwid=equals&where-kwid=&max_rows=24