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Ornamental plum is a tree with unusual red foliage, interesting not only for its delicious fruits, but also for its attractive appearance. It is worth studying the description of the red-leaved plum with a photo and evaluating its merits.
Meet the decorative plum with red leaves
When choosing the first trees for their garden, most gardeners do not think about their appearance - the main role is played by tasty fruits. However, over time, the need for beauty arises - and then the decorative red-leaved plum comes to the rescue.
The leaves of the ornamental plum are not green, like most trees, but a rich red-violet color. Therefore, in the garden the plant acts as a bright accent. If a decorative plum with red leaves is chosen to be tall and spreading, then it stands out against the background of other trees, and if it is squat and short, it can border them or serve as a hedge.
What varieties of red plum are there?
Plum with burgundy leaves is divided into many varieties, but they are usually combined into four large varieties:
- Russian.
- Spread out.
- Decorative purple leaf.
- Plum Hollywood.
Line of hybrids “Russian plum”
Particularly popular in the middle zone are varieties of decorative Russian plums, obtained from crossing southern cherry plums with Ussuri or Chinese plums.
Scarlet Sails
The red-leaved plum of this variety is a tree up to 4 - 5 m in height, with a thinned but spreading crown, with large leaves of a rich red color. The plum, with red leaves and dark pink flowers, bears fruit in mid-August. Scarlet sails have a dark crimson color and average weight - each fruit weighs about 25 g.
Among the advantages of Scarlet Sails are high resistance to negative temperatures and drought, and low susceptibility to fungal diseases. The tree produces abundant harvests and bears fruit every year, but is classified as self-sterile. For Scarlet Sails, Chinese plum varieties Skoroplodnaya and Krasny Shar, as well as cherry plum Dynaya can become pollinators.
Lama
This decorative variety of Russian plum is distinguished by its small size - 1.3 - 2 m. The crown is round-flat, thick, the leaves are dark red throughout the summer period. Plum with pink flowers produces large raspberry fruits, each of which can weigh up to 40 g.
Redleaf Lama variety It was bred specifically for cultivation in the middle zone, so it can easily tolerate frosts down to -35 degrees. The tree's shoots are not afraid of light spring frosts; the variety has increased resistance to pests and diseases.
Llama is a self-fertile ornamental plum, so pollinators are required for high annual yields. Chinese plums and cherry plums with flowering in mid-May are well suited for this variety - for example, Vitba, Mara and Asaloda.
Early
Russian plum Early is a large tree up to 7 m in height with a rounded crown, large red leaves with serrated edges and a brown underside of the leaf. It has equally good resistance to frost, diseases and pests, and produces abundant harvests of dark red fruits.
The tree, like most plum varieties, is self-sterile, and therefore requires pollinators, for which cherry plums and Chinese plums with early flowering are ideal.
Nigra
Another red-leaved ornamental variety is Nigra, a low tree with an oval crown. Young leaves are ruby in color, while mature leaves are dark purple. The red-leaved plum blooms with pink flowers in late April or early May, even before the foliage appears on the branches. At the end of August it bears dark red round fruits.
It tolerates frosts below - 30 degrees and summer drought, does not break in the wind, and rarely suffers from diseases typical of fruit trees. The pollinator for the variety can be the Eurasia plum or the domestic Hungarian plum.
Plum splayed
The spreading plum belongs to the category of red-leaved trees of tall and medium height with abundant and rapid fruiting - the first harvests are harvested from it already 2 years after planting. As a rule, plum varieties are intended for growing in warm climates.
Hesey
A bush variety of red-leaved plum called Hesei produces regular green foliage at first - but then the leaves turn purple, with pink or cream edges. The variety blooms with white flowers at the end of April, before the leaves bloom or simultaneously with it. Bears sweet and sour small red fruits.
The variety is characterized by low frost resistance and tolerates negative temperatures only up to – 28 degrees. Among the diseases that remain dangerous for him are black or holey spots. To obtain fruits, it is necessary to plant splayed plums with similar flowering periods nearby.
Pissardi
An Iranian plum variety up to 6 m tall with dark purple leaves and red shoots. Pissardi is an ornamental plum with pink flowers that blooms in early spring before the leaves bloom. In August it produces abundant pink fruits, provided that other varieties of spreading red-leaved plum have been planted nearby for pollination and bloom at the end of April.
The frost resistance of the Pissardi variety is not very high - from -20 to -28 degrees. But the tree is highly resistant to disease.
Cystene
This ornamental variety was obtained by breeding sand cherry and red-leaved Pissardi plum. The dwarf plant grows only up to 2 m, and at the same time it grows very slowly, so Cysten plum is often classified as a shrub with a columnar crown. The leaves are elongated, rounded and toothed, dark purple on the underside and red-violet on top.
The red-leaved Cystena blooms in early spring with white flowers with a red core, and in late summer it bears fruit - dark purple small drupes.If you plant other varieties of short red-leaved plums nearby, Cystena will delight you with abundant harvests.
The frost resistance of the variety is low, so it is not recommended to breed Cystena in cold regions. But the variety is quite resistant to diseases and pests.
Purple-leaved decorative plum: photo + description
The decorative purple-leaved plum is ideal for decorating the garden - a shrub reaching 1.5 in height, with elongated lanceolate leaves. At the very beginning, the foliage of the plum bush is dark red, then as it matures it can turn to a dark brown shade. The purple-leaved ornamental plum produces white or light pink flowers at the same time as its foliage appears, and bears a harvest of dark red fruit in late September.
It is best to plant plums in windless, sunny places, in well-drained, slightly alkaline or acidified soil. The shrub has high winter hardiness.
Red-leaved plum variety "Hollywood"
One of the most popular red-leaved varieties is Hollywood. The plum tree reaches several meters in height and is distinguished by a spreading, sparse crown formed by dark red shoots and red leaves. Hollywood blooms with white flowers. It is not only the appearance of the plant that is attractive, which can be appreciated from the photo of a plum with red leaves. The variety also bears purple-red tasty fruits in mid-August.
Hollywood enters the harvest period 5 years after planting and produces juicy and sweet fruits. The best pollinators for a self-sterile variety will be the collective farm Renklod and the Mirnaya plum.
The nuances of growing ornamental plums
Plum varieties with burgundy leaves can be quite different from each other - it is quite difficult to formulate uniform rules of care for them. But general nuances still exist.
- Decorative plums do not like overly waterlogged soil; it is better to plant them in soil with a neutral acidity level.
- Before planting in the seedling hole, it is necessary to add organic fertilizers - humus and superphosphate, which will nourish the plant in the first 3 years of life.
- After entering the harvest season, red-leaved plums are regularly fed with mineral fertilizers and organic matter. In the spring it is necessary to apply nitrogen fertilizers, in the summer - a solution of mullein and potassium. In autumn, the soil around trees and shrubs is dug up and also flavored with humus.
- Decorative plums should be watered as needed - the soil should not be allowed to dry out. Usually, once every 1–2 months, with moderate precipitation, 4–5 buckets of water are added under the roots.
Decorative plum with red leaves necessarily needs pruning, which is carried out annually. Red-leaved trees and especially shrubs tolerate pruning well; their crowns are given a round, sparse or vase-like shape.
Conclusion
Decorative plum with red leaves is an excellent decoration for any garden. It is mainly used as a landscape element, but in the presence of pollinators, red-leaved varieties will produce stable yields.
