Aronia × prunifolia
Plum-leaved chokeberry
Common names: Wild chokeberry, Purple chokeberry
At a glance
- Light
- Full sun
- Hardiness
- Hardy down to −30 °C
- Pruning
- Feb–Mar
- Harvest
- Sep–Oct
- Spacing
- 150 cm, rows 200 cm
- Water need
- Medium
Photo: Kurt Stüber [1] · CC BY-SA 3.0 · Source
This description was machine-translated.
Description
The Plum-leaved chokeberry is a natural hybrid of black and red chokeberries, closer to the wild form than cultivated varieties. Its dark violet berries are tart and astringent, rich in tannins. Raw berries are quite astringent, but as juice, jelly, or dried fruit they are a flavorful treasure. In autumn the foliage turns fiery red. The shrub is modest, disease‑resistant, and extremely winter hardy.
Care instructions
Plant the Wild chokeberry in autumn (October, week 42) or spring (March, week 11) in a sunny to partially shaded spot. It tolerates almost any soil but prefers a humus‑rich, slightly acidic substrate. Water regularly during the first year. In winter (February, week 7) prune only old, withered shoots to keep the shrub young and productive.
The care notes were machine-translated from German.
Garden year
HarvestSep–Oct
Soil & site
Soil pH
Soil type
loamy, humus-rich, well-drained, moist
The purple chokeberry is undemanding as to soil, but thrives best on slightly acidic, humus-rich, evenly moist mixed soils of loam, sand and humus. It does not like heavy, waterlogged soils or strongly calcareous, alkaline sites. Above pH 7, chlorosis threatens. A mulch layer helps you keep the soil moist.
Feeding
Medium feeder
Months
Mar–Apr
In spring before the leaves unfold, spread mature compost around the shrub and work it in shallowly. On lean soils you can add some horn shavings to cover the nitrogen needed at the start of growth. The chokeberry is frugal. Young plants in the first years in place especially benefit from the spring dose; older ones hardly need nutrients any more.
Pruning
Your purple chokeberry needs hardly any pruning: from the 4th to 6th year in place, thin it out in late winter (mid-February to early March · weeks 7 to 10) by removing the oldest shoots close to the ground from the inside of the shrub. The leafless shrub gives you a good overview, and the cuts are healed and frost-proof by the time growth starts.
Overwintering
The purple chokeberry is fully hardy and needs no winter protection in the Central European lowlands. You can leave the shrub in the ground without covering or wrapping it. It is best to cut older shoots back close to the ground in late winter on a frost-free day to thin the plant out.
Propagation
Methods
- Cuttings
- Layering
- From seed
- Division
The chokeberry can be propagated in four ways, most reliably by cuttings and by its root suckers.
Cuttings (simplest method): In early summer (end of May to beginning of June), cut semi-ripe shoot tips about 10–20 cm long. Remove the lower leaves and keep two to three at the top. Insert them in a mixture of sand and low-nutrient seed compost and keep the substrate evenly moist at 15–20 °C. Roots form after four to eight weeks. Alternatively, hardwood cuttings taken in winter are suitable, which you heel in cool until spring.
Layering (very safe, hardly any effort): In spring, choose a long shoot growing close to the ground. Score it lightly on the underside, bend it into a shallow hollow and cover the wounded spot with soil. Weigh it down with a stone. Keep the spot moist; by autumn the layer has rooted and can be separated.
Root suckers / division (fastest success): The chokeberry reliably forms root suckers. In spring or autumn, separate strong suckers from the mother shrub with a spade and plant them immediately. With older shrubs you can divide the whole root ball.
Sowing (true to type possible thanks to apomixis): Aronia × prunifolia is tetraploid and reproduces via apomixis; the seedlings are genetically almost identical to the mother plant and grow up true to type. In autumn, take ripe berries, wash the seeds out of the flesh and mix them with moist sand. Store the mixture for two to three months cool in the fridge (cold stratification). Sow near the surface in spring and keep the bed moist.
Companion planting
Good neighbors
Companion planting is partly traditional gardening lore. Where the reason is known, it is given.
Some of these explanations were machine-translated.
For your garden
Grow Plum-leaved chokeberry yourself
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