Scottish Rock Garden Club Forum

Plant Identification => Plant Identification Questions and Answers => Topic started by: annew on September 08, 2011, 11:20:48 AM

Title: Sloes, bullaces or damsons?
Post by: annew on September 08, 2011, 11:20:48 AM
Does anyone know of a reasonably accurate definition of the difference between these forms of wild plum? We would like to be able to ID the different plants that occur locally for a survey of the local hedgerows.
Title: Re: Sloes, bullaces or damsons?
Post by: Maggi Young on September 08, 2011, 11:36:19 AM
Good luck, Anne.... I think it's easier said than done.... I'd throw Mirabelles into the mix too......


picture from:
http://www.britishlarder.co.uk/healthy-bran-conference-pear-and-bullace-breakfast-muffins/#axzz1XM85CVGU .... where there is a tasty recipe!

Title: Re: Sloes, bullaces or damsons?
Post by: arisaema on September 08, 2011, 11:50:18 AM
Aren't both bullaces and damsons Prunus domestica ssp. insititia while sloes are P. spinosa? I thought only the latter had spines?
Title: Re: Sloes, bullaces or damsons?
Post by: mark smyth on September 08, 2011, 01:13:41 PM
Sloes you will spit out but make brilliant sloe gin

Damsons lovely and sweet but the skins will make you shudder

http://www.sloe.biz/pip/viewtopic.php?p=1398 (http://www.sloe.biz/pip/viewtopic.php?p=1398)
Title: Re: Sloes, bullaces or damsons?
Post by: mark smyth on September 08, 2011, 01:17:25 PM
I have never seen or heard of Mirabelles

While on wild fruit my local council has removed all the Rubus spectabilis, salmon berry, bushes along the river because they are not native
Title: Re: Sloes, bullaces or damsons?
Post by: mark smyth on September 08, 2011, 01:24:43 PM
Mirabelle Prunus x domestica ssp. syriaca
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mirabelle_plum (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mirabelle_plum)

Damson Prunus domestica subsp. insititia
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Damson (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Damson)

Sloe Prunus spinosa
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sloe (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sloe)

Bullace = Damson
Title: Re: Sloes, bullaces or damsons?
Post by: gote on September 08, 2011, 05:15:32 PM
I have never seen or heard of Mirabelles

While on wild fruit my local council has removed all the Rubus spectabilis, salmon berry, bushes along the river because they are not native

Will they remove all specimen of Homo sapiens as well? They are also invaders from somewhere.
(I am nearly serious )
Göte
Title: Re: Sloes, bullaces or damsons?
Post by: gote on September 08, 2011, 05:17:35 PM
Sloes you will spit out but make brilliant sloe gin

Sloe liqueur is quite good too - and perhaps easier to make
Göte

Title: Re: Sloes, bullaces or damsons?
Post by: Brian Ellis on September 08, 2011, 06:28:09 PM
Damson Gin is very acceptable too!
Title: Re: Sloes, bullaces or damsons?
Post by: annew on September 09, 2011, 02:01:08 PM
I just knew it would end up in a discussion of alcoholic beverages! I've googled till I've dropped and the various references all seem to contradict each other. Also we seem to have everything from a true sloe to small spherical dark purple sweet plums and (I suspect) a hybrid swarm in between. We're going to need a lot of gin..
Title: Re: Sloes, bullaces or damsons?
Post by: mark smyth on September 09, 2011, 06:15:04 PM
By coincidence the girls at the garden centre where I bought my Frits asked if I knew how to make sloe gin or damson vodka.

We also discussed planting of the Frits. They had seen Gardener's World last Friday and told me to plant them on their sides .... they are now educated :D
Title: Re: Sloes, bullaces or damsons?
Post by: David Nicholson on September 09, 2011, 06:48:16 PM
Sloe Gin

http://www.bbc.co.uk/food/recipes/sloegin_7722

Damson Gin

http://www.waitrose.com/home/recipes/recipe_directory/d/damson_gin_with_orange.html
Title: Re: Sloes, bullaces or damsons?
Post by: Richard Green on September 09, 2011, 07:11:50 PM
I have just returned from visiting my parents in Norfolk, and enjoyed both stewed damsons and bullaces from my mother's garden last week.  They need plenty of added sugar when cooked.  Her sloes are too bitter to stew, but they can be made into good gin as per the recipe links above.

Anne, Here is my identification key:
1.  If the fruit is yellow or greenish-yellow then it is certainly a bullace - usually between 1cm-2cm in diameter.
2.  Damsons and sloes are both deep blue, almost black, with a whitish bloom.
3.  Damsons are the same size as bullaces, and generally soft when squeezed at this time of year.
4.  If smaller (rarely more than 1cm in diameter) and almost rock hard then they are sloes.
5.  Sloes usually have smaller boat-shaped leaves, leaves of damsons are are more pear-shaped.

I make Damson Gin, and find that it is much better the second Christmas than the first.  If you can wait that long......

Dont try to take any fruit or jam through airport security in hand baggage.  We tried (by accident) this time last year and had a hard job persuading a very nice security lady that they were not potentially dangerous and explosive "gels"!
Title: Re: Sloes, bullaces or damsons?
Post by: David Nicholson on September 09, 2011, 07:17:25 PM
We never see Damsons in the shops around us. My old Dad used to do a longish detour, on his return journey back to Huddersfield after trips to Lancaster, via the southern Lake District just to buy them where at this time of the year there were lots. Being TT jam was Dad's forte.
Title: Re: Sloes, bullaces or damsons?
Post by: Gerry Webster on September 09, 2011, 07:59:13 PM
Damsons are on sale in my local supermarket (Waitrose) at the moment. One thing I miss in the S of England are wild bilberries which were sold in Leeds market when I was a kid. Cultivated blueberries are a very poor substitute.
Title: Re: Sloes, bullaces or damsons?
Post by: David Nicholson on September 09, 2011, 08:02:07 PM
Agreed Gerry. When my kids were small we used to pick wild bilberries on the moors above Bury where we lived then. I did find some, in jars, from Poland but they weren't a patch on the real thing.
Title: Re: Sloes, bullaces or damsons?
Post by: Lesley Cox on September 11, 2011, 01:21:50 AM
I don't like cultivated blueberries. They taste of... well... nothing much really. :-\
Title: Re: Sloes, bullaces or damsons?
Post by: annew on September 16, 2011, 10:49:53 PM
Thanks, all!
Title: Re: Sloes, bullaces or damsons?
Post by: Paddy Tobin on September 17, 2011, 09:14:02 AM
Damsons are just ready for picking here. I usually make a jelly from them.     Paddy
Title: Re: Sloes, bullaces or damsons?
Post by: mark smyth on October 11, 2011, 05:57:00 PM
On the Autumn Watch they had a short feature on wild fruits.

Damsons are oval while bullaces are round
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