All Red Plum Tree

We don’t have to make a hard choice between a beautiful garden and a productive one, and you don’t need a special part of the garden labelled ‘food’ and another called ‘pretty’. There are many plants that belong equally in both, and if you like fruit then a great place to start with a garden like that is by growing the All Red Plum Tree. Also called the Purple-leaf Plum, this lovely tree has it all. Profuse spring blooms in glowing pink, lovely red new leaves that turn purple for the summer, and heavy crops of small purple plums that are temptingly edible fresh or turned into preserves. The fruit is popular in much of Europe, snapped up when it comes briefly into season in summer, and the tree is often grown entirely for its beauty, without regard for the fruit. Whatever your reason for growing it, this truly is a tree that belongs everywhere in any garden. Tough and reliable across much of the country, it’s all thumbs up for the All Red Plum.

Growing the All Red Plum Tree

Size and Appearance

The All Red Plum Tree is a deciduous flowering tree that will grow between 2 and 3 feet a year when young, soon becoming a handsome feature and ultimately reaching up to 25 feet tall or more, with a broad spread. The bark is smooth and glossy on young stems, dark reddish-brown, turning more rough and rugged on older stems and the main trunk. It flowers early and profusely, in March or April, with the flowers opening just as the first baby leaves are showing. The blossoms are each about 1-inch across, dark pink in bud, opening to charming bowls of 5 broad petals, colored light pink. A tree in bloom is a delightful sight and a true ‘welcome’ to another spring season. The leaves expand as the flowers fade, and they are 1½ to 2½ inches long and about 1 inch wide, oval, with fine, soft ‘teeth’ along the edges and a pointed tip. They have a satin-gloss surface and young leaves are a rich wine-red. As the leaves mature they turn more purple, and this color is held well into summer, although in very hot areas they may become more greenish by August.

The fruits of the All Red Plum Tree are relatively small, about 1 inch across, but they are often carried in abundance. Unlike many other plum varieties, this one is self-fertile, and a single tree carries a good crop. The fruit is truly ‘all-red’, because both the skin and the flesh are rich, dark red. The crop is ready in late June or July – well before most other plums are ripe. The flavor is sweet and tangy, and delicious. You will find yourself popping them into your mouth like cherries. They also cook well, into compotes or pies, or they make delicious preserves and jams.

Using the All Red Plum Tree in Your Garden

Truly a dual-purpose tree, you can grow this tree everywhere in your garden, from a suitable spot right beside your home, to the edges of wooded areas, the back of shrub beds, or in your dedicated orchard area.

Hardiness

The All Red Plum Tree needs only 350 chill hours during winter, times when temperatures are below 45 degrees. So it will grow, bloom and fruit well even in zone 9, while the tree is tough enough to certainly survive winters in zone 5. Almost wherever you live, this tree can live with you.

Sun Exposure and Soil Conditions

Full sun is best to develop the leaf colors and ripen the plum of this tree. It will grow well in any well-drained soil, even poorer urban soils, and in different soil types, including alkaline soils, where often the choices of trees are more limited. It has some moderate drought resistance, and given that the crop is going to be over before summer drought arrives, you can rely on an established tree to handle it without much problem.

Maintenance and Pruning

This tree is relatively pest and disease free, especially for a fruit tree, so it’s unlikely you will need to worry about that. Birds can be a problem with many fruit trees, but fortunately, with the All Red Plum Tree, the fruit is largely hidden by the leaves, and since the plums and leaves are the same color, birds generally don’t notice them, and you can gather an easy harvest. Prune for shape and to prevent overcrowded branches, as you would any flowering tree, and shorten new shoots a little so that they don’t break with the weight of the crop they will carry the next year.

History and Origin of the All Red Plum Tree

This tree is a selected form of a tree Prunus divaricata, which is often seen in gardens as the cherry plum, or myrobalan, Prunus cerasifera. These trees are probably in fact simply varieties of the same species. It grows wild throughout Central Asia, from the Caucus Mountains to Iran and even further east. The country of Iran at one time had an absolute, king-like ruler called the Shah. The Shah of Iran in the late 19th century had a French head-gardener at his palace, Monsieur Pissard. In the hills around Tehran he found a plant of cherry plum with pink flowers, while all the other wild trees had white ones. As well, the leaves were red, not green. In 1880 he sent the plant to France, where it became popular and was soon spread around the world. At first called atropurpurea, today we should correctly call it, ‘Pissardii’.

Buying the All Red Plum Tree at the Tree Center

Every garden should be both beautiful and productive. Make yours that way by planting the All Red Plum Tree in it. Fruit production shouldn’t be hard, and with this tree it truly isn’t. But order right away, because this popular tree is loved by all gardeners, and our supply will be gone very soon.