Black Gum Tree Fruit Edible

Blackgum fruit are a half inch long appear in fall and are bluish black.

Black gum tree fruit edible. One of the most outstanding attributes of the blackgum is its glossy brilliant red leaf color in the early fall. Black gum is becoming a popular landscaping tree. Other photos are for illustrative purposes showing the fruit and our parent plant. The branches are alternate with simple 5 inch long leaves that are shiny green above and paler and hairy underneath.

The plants are dioecious male and female flowers on separate trees as well as polygamo dioecious male and female flowers on the same tree. Fruits are ovoid bluish black and have a white coating. They are used in the food industry as thickening agents gelling agents emulsifying agents and stabilizers and in other industrial adhesives. Like many trees the black tupelo also called the black gum tree and the sour gum barely makes it into the edible realm.

The wood is used for veneer plywood boxes pulp tool handles gunstocks docks and wharves. The pulp of its fruit is technically edible extremely sour and extremely bitter which is why it is usually used in sweetened preserves. Natural gums are polysaccharides of natural origin capable of causing a large increase in a solution s viscosity even at small concentrations they are mostly botanical gums found in the woody elements of plants or in seed coatings. It offers an impressive scarlet fall color and lacks the spiny balls of the unrelated sweet gum.

Clusters of three fruits are usually found. If a female tree has been planted it will have half inch long dark blue black fruit which are readily consumed by the birds and the squirrels though they are too tart for human consumption. Although flowers are not showy they are an excellent nectar source for bees. Tkhe bark is dark gray with rectangular fissures that give a blocky appearance.

This is a low chill variety of plum that is self fertile and will fruit on the sunshine coast. Japanese plum tree mariposa pick up only in tewantin noosa area the plants we are selling can be seen in picture 2 they are 49 each. The bark is dark gray and flaky when young but it becomes furrowed with age resembling alligator hide on very. The fruit is edible but very sour.

Small greenish white flowers appear in spring on long stalks female flowers in sparse clusters and male flowers in dense heads. The elliptic leaves are dark green and glossy. This tree is also known as sour gum or pepperidge and was called tupelo by native americans. These trees typically have a straight trunk with the branches extending outward at right angles.

The yellowish white seeds are football shaped and have grooves running their entire length.