ROSACEAE 171 



The fruit has a sweet taste. This is a favorite fruit tree in Southern 

 China, and the only species under cultivation. The tree is very orna- 

 mental, with thin, dark green foliage and conspicuous panicles of fragrant 

 flowers ■ which bloom from late summer until the approach of winter. 

 The fruits come into the market toward the last of April and the first 

 part of May. Numerous horticultural varieties have been developed. 



SORBUS 



Trees or shrubs. Leaves deciduous, alternate, simple, or pinnate, 

 serrate and stipulate. Flowers in compound corymbs; calyx urn-shaped, 

 5 lobed ; petals 5, rounded, white, rarely pinkish; stamens 15-20, anthers 

 red or yellow; carpels 2-5, usually 3, either free and partly superior or 

 ^connate at the base; ovules 2 in each cell. Fruit a berry-like pome, 2-5 

 celled, flesh red or reddish-orange, subacid. Seeds 1 or 2 in each cell. 



About 80 species, distributed in the Northern Hemisphere. The 

 genus has been referred to Pyrus from which it differs by its inflorescence, 

 the flowers being usually perigynous, and by its generally small, berry- 

 like fruits. They are handsome ornamental trees or shrubs with 

 attractive simple or pinnate foliage, clustered showy flowers followed by 

 numerous, small, berry-like, bright, usually red, colored fruits. The 

 fruits of several species are edible. 



Sorbus alni folia Koch. 



Chinese Mountain Ash. 



Tree 18 m. tall. Bark smooth and gray. Branchlets glabrous or 

 slightly pubescent, reddish, marked by oblong lenticels. Leaves simple, 

 ovate, acute, often acuminate, rounded at base, or occasionally cuneate, 

 serrate, or doubly serrate, thin or slightly leathery, dark green above, 

 pale and more or less pubescent below, 5-10 cm. long. Inflorescence a 

 loose, few-flowered corymb; flowers 7-14 mm. across, white; calyx and 

 peduncles pubescent; stamens exserted. Fruit oblong or subglobose, 

 small, 7-10 mm. long, reddish, tinged with yellow and conspicuously 

 marked by the scar of the deciduous calyx. 



Central China, Manchuria, Korea, and Japan. An attractive tree of 

 pyramidal habit with alder-like leaves and reddish fruit produced in 

 great numbers. It is now commonly cultivated in European and 

 American gardens. 



