Black chokeberry
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Black chokeberry ( Aronia melanocarpa ) |
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| Aronia melanocarpa | ||||||||||||
| ( Michx. ) Elliott |
The black chokeberry ( Aronia melanocarpa ) is a species of chokeberry ( Aronia ) within the rose family (Rosaceae). Sometimes it is also called bald chokeberry or black mountain ash ; however, it does not belong to the same genus Sorbus as the mountain ash .
Description, ecology and similarity to other species
The black chokeberry grows as a deciduous shrub and reaches heights of 1 to 3 meters. The bark is smooth and grayish.
The black chokeberry is very similar to the felted chokeberry ( Aronia arbutifolia ) in terms of foliage and flowers , although the initial hairiness soon disappears; the foliage is less shiny.
The simple, short-stalked and alternate leaves are obovate to elliptical, lanceolate or rounded. The short petiole is up to 5 mm long, the blade is up to 7–9 cm long and 3–4 cm wide. The leaves are finely serrated at the edge, with reddish glands covered teeth and at the top they are pointed to pointed. The leaves are weakly to slightly hairy underneath and on the upper side they are covered with reddish glands on the central vein. There are small stipules present. The autumn color is reddish.
In some areas, the flowering period extends from May to June (from July to August). There are terminal, upright, and Multiflora screen traubige formed inflorescences. The white, fragrant and stalked flowers are hermaphrodite and are pollinated by insects . The flowers are five-fold with a double flower envelope, the flower stalk is more or less hairy. The small, green to more or less reddish and almost bald outside and hairy inside, with small tips, is glandular. The bare, spreading petals are nailed short with a rounded plate . There are many stamens with reddish anthers. The multi-chambered ovary is subordinate, with five, basally approximated or just overgrown styles . There is a discus .
The ripe, round apple fruits ( false fruit ) are black and shiny, and about 6–10 (cultivated up to 16) millimeters in size. At the top, the sunk calyx with calyx cavity is preserved, they are almost bald or slightly hairy. They fall off soon after they ripen in autumn. Their taste is bitter and sweet, the pulp is usually reddish in color. The 5–10, approximately 3–4 millimeters large, brown, egg-shaped to crescent-shaped seeds in the paper compartments, ripen from October to December.
Spread and horticultural history
Aronia melanocarpa is native to the northeastern United States . It came to Russia around 1900 , where the nutritional value of the fruit was finally recognized and investigated.
In the 1950s, the fruit finally came to Central Europe via the Balkans . The robust shrubs, which are hardly affected by pests and fungi , are now grown not only in the Czech Republic and Slovenia , but also in Germany, in the Free State of Saxony (before 1989 in Sörnewitz , today on plantations in Sörnewitz, Stolpen near Dresden, Schirgiswalde , in the Oberlausitz and Rothenburg Görlitz ) and Bavaria in the district of Landshut .
use
Use as a food crop
The fruits are used to make jelly , jam , juice , wine and liqueur .
The fruits have a tart, sour taste , somewhat reminiscent of blueberries . The nuclei contain amygdalin . However, eating smaller quantities fresh is absolutely harmless. Their juice is increasingly found industrially processed, often together with other fruit juices. The dried fruits can serve as a substitute for hibiscus flowers in tea blends . The fruits are an important supplier of food coloring for processing in the food industry .
Use as a medicinal plant
Ripe fresh or dried fruits are used as medicinal drugs . They contain anthocyanin dyes and flavonoids as active ingredients , have a high vitamin and mineral content , including a noticeable amount of folic acid , iron and iodine , as well as sugar and small amounts of tannins .
Medicinal applications are known from Russia so far , where the chokeberry is used in folk medicine against high blood pressure , gastric mucosal inflammation , urinary tract infections or hardening of the arteries . In terms of ingredients , the chokeberry could possibly also gain importance in Central Europe .
Cultural forms
There are the varieties and also others:
- 'Viking': large, flat, spherical, black, shiny fruits, larger than 'Nero', up to 16 mm in size. Not quite as aromatic as the wild form , but more productive and bred for hand harvesting with heights of around 1.5 to over 2 meters.
- 'Nero': about 12 mm in size, very juicy, hardly shiny, aromatic fruits that can be used very well for making jams or the like. Height 1.5 to over 2 meters, the tannin content of these fruits is lower than that of the wild form. It is the most widely grown and most productive variety in Germany and Poland. In East Germany it has been part of culture since the 1970s; In West German tree nurseries it is offered as the "Black Colorado berry".
- 'Rubina': large, up to 14 mm in size, dark purple, waxy fruits, very productive, height up to 1.5–1.8 meters. Extremely colorful. Antioxidant. Was bred in Hungary, plant variety protection has existed since 1994 .
- 'Hugin': up to 7 mm in size, purple-black, small fruits, usually less than 1.2–1.5 meters high, very productive with a high vitamin C content, grown in Sweden , therefore very frost-resistant.
swell
- Botanica, trees and bushes, over 2000 plant portraits. 2006, ISBN 3-8331-4467-X , p. 105, as Aronia melanocarpa
- Joachim Mayer, Heinz-Werner Schwegler: Which tree is that? Trees, bushes, ornamental trees. ISBN 978-3-440-11273-1 , p. 166, as bald chokeberry, aronia melanocarpa
- Ingrid and Peter Schönfelder: The new book of medicinal plants. Franckh-Kosmos Verlag, 2011, ISBN 978-3-440-12932-6 .
- Marilena Idžojtić: Dendrology. Academic Press, 2018, ISBN 978-0-444-64175-5 , p. 82.
Individual evidence
- ↑ Joachim Mayer, Heinz-Werner Schwegler: Which tree is that? Franckh-Kosmos Verlag, Stuttgart 2008, ISBN 978-3-440-11273-1 , p. 166 .
- ↑ apfelbeere.org: Aronia Melanocarpa. Retrieved on August 24, 2011 (description of the species Aronia melanocarpa ).
- ↑ Aroniabeere.de: Consumption of aronia not questionable. (No longer available online.) Archived from the original on July 11, 2016 ; Retrieved July 11, 2016 .
- ↑ Gordon Cheers (Ed.): Botanica. The ABC of plants. 10,000 species in text and images . Könemann Verlagsgesellschaft, 2003, ISBN 3-8331-1600-5 , p. 113 .
- ↑ Kulturblatt Aronia. (PDF), at BBZ Arenenberg - Kanton Thurgau, accessed on September 17, 2019.
Web links
- Aronia melanocarpa in the Germplasm Resources Information Network (GRIN), USDA , ARS , National Genetic Resources Program. National Germplasm Resources Laboratory, Beltsville, Maryland.
- Aronia melanocarpa on missouriplants.com, accessed September 17, 2019.
- Aronia melanocarpa at Useful Temperate Plants.
- The black chokeberry: Aronia melanocarpa on flora-obscura.de, accessed on September 17, 2019.