Plum - fruit tree from the extensive Pink family (Rosaceae).They belong to the same taxonomic group, many well-known to children and adults fruit crops: apple, cherry, apricot, peach, strawberry, raspberry.Let us examine the question that is most often is: "Plum - a berry or fruit?".No wonder that many are confused about the terms.
Plum - berry or fruit?
Among plum fruit trees occupy a place of honor, because in ancient times people grow it for the sake of the harvest.Prepared from the fruit of plum, blackthorn, cherry plum, sweet dishes, sauces and drinks.Plum - a tree or shrub from 1 to 6 m. All the groups of varieties and wild species - high-yielding plants.
Fruit - drupe odnokostochkovaya - on-site flower formed after fertilization.Before maturation pericarp some time remains solid, colored green.With the accumulation of nutrients the fetus becomes more juicy, and within it, in the special slot, forming a solid bone with seed.
What are the benefits?
from Latin into Russian for a long time came the term "fruit", did not stick to the scientific use.But in medicine, nutrition, cooking and everyday life the word is very popular, although not everyone can interpret it correctly.What is different from a fruit berries?Plum belongs to which of these two groups?
accepted that fruit - this is the same as that of the fetus because it is translated from the Latin word fructus.Other edible parts of plants, and the plants themselves, may even refer to such economic groups, such as vegetables, grains, nuts.Among the fruits emit two groups of juicy fruits: berries and drupes.They differ in the number of seeds and number of other features.
will understand thoroughly plum - a fruit or a berry really.We must distinguish scientific terms and economic definition.Types of fruit plants in botany vary in consistency and amount of seed husk.There are 4 main groups - dry and juicy, seeded and polyspermous.
plum what type of fruit?
drupe - plums, cherries, apricots - are juicy, containing a single seed.Berries - too juicy but polyspermous fruit.They arise from one or more carpels.There are entirely fleshy berries with a thin skin, like grapes, berries and leathery, which the pericarp thick, like an orange.So after all, plum - a berry or fruit?The second concept is more extensive and includes a first, ie berries - is a type of fruit (fruit).
of botanical science, do not hesitate to define the plum - a berry or fruit.Seeing the fruits of juicy plums and grapes, they say that in front of them drupe and berry.Nutritionist, sales staff, ordinary people explain that one and the other - the fruit.All will be right in his reasoning and conclusions.Thus, the drain - no berry.It should be recalled that the berries can also be considered a fruit, that of economic activity, life is not considered an error.After all - the fruit (lat. Fructus).
Plum refers to trees or shrubs?
In appearance plants can be assigned to different life forms.The main ones are the following groups: trees, shrubs, herbaceous plants, vines.Life forms - a kind of adaptation to the conditions of existence.
After we easily understood the problem indicated above - drain - is a berry or fruit - to answer the question about the form of life will be more difficult.In appearance plants belonging to the genus plum are low trees and shrubs.The most common type - Damsons garden.In the wild tree found in the Caucasus.
Variety of species of the subgenus Prunus
still in the woods, in ravines are found wild plums, but most species belonging to the subgenus long domesticated.They give a rich harvest of medium and large fruits of different colors with the characteristic flat seeds inside.Their length is generally greater than the thickness of 1.5 times the diameter - 1-3 cm. New varieties that give large fruit up to 8 cm, sweet or sour taste.Common species in Eurasia:
- Home Garden - the usual form for central Russia.
- prickly, thistle thorns - a small, very thorny bush with blue fruits.
- splayed, plum - tree, reaching a height of 8 m. In the wild form is found in the Caucasus and Central Asia.
- Ussuriysk - wildly dwells in Primorye and cultivated for fruit in Eastern Siberia.
- China - is grown in China, Japan, Korea.The fruits of sweet and sour, are widely used in cooking and wine.
- Pissardi - ornamental tree with beautiful pink petals and dark red foliage.It is used in landscape design.
When a bramble bush confusion arises: is this drain?Berries or fruits - his dark blue shirt fruit?Plum too surprising its fruiting.Although it looks like a plum tree, but the color of his rich harvest unusual - red and yellow (less common purple and blue fruits).
Good quality plums
People use the fruits of wild and cultivated plants in food processing to juices, jams, jams, cordials, as the filling for baking, as a medicinal plant.Plum home has long been cultivated for the sake of juicy drupes with a bluish bloom.Fruits of plum home include:
- carbohydrates (fructose, glucose);
- vitamins C, A, P, group B;
- organic acids;
- tannins;
- minerals;
- pectins.
preparations of fruit pulp and seeds of plums used in folk and official medicine.Prunes are used in a dietary food, confectionery industry.Plum blossoms early and abundant, even before the full opening of leaves.Trees and shrubs look very smart, are valued in landscaping.
Traditionally, in the XX century were isolated as part of the type two groups of cultivars - Hungarian and greengage.First presented by trees and bushes with blue-violet rounded or elongated fruits.Greengage often have spherical fruits greenish color.Now the main focus becomes the removal of undersized subspecies, interbreeding and getting hybrids, such as plum and apricot.
