Edible Wild Fruits of New York. 



101 



names that have been applied to this plant, it must have been very 

 popular years ago. Rafinesque gives a list of fifteen names that had 

 been applied to it. 



The persimmon (Diospyros Virginiana) is a small tree bearing a 

 globose, seedy fruit about an inch in diameter and yellow or orange 

 colored when ripe. This is harsh and unpleasant to the taste till fully 

 ripe, or until it has been subjected to the action of frost. The tree 

 barely enters our limits on the south, occurring on Staten Island and 

 possibly in "Westchester county. Rafinesque pronounces it valuable 

 and worthy of cultivation, but it does not appear to have acquired 

 popularity as a fruit tree. 



In the Nightshade family, which has given us such valuable escu- 

 lents as the potato and tomato, we have two species whose fruits are 

 sometimes eaten. The common or black nightshade (Solarium ni- 

 grum) is an annual which grows in shaded grounds, fields or waste 

 places, and bears black berries about the size of peas. These were for- 

 merly reputed poisonous, but Professor Bessey says that in the Mis- 

 sissippi valley people use them for making pies. Probably if they 

 really have any poisonous property it is expelled by cooking. The 

 plant was formerly regarded as an introduced species, but it is now 

 considered indigenous. The ground-cherry (Physalis viscosa) is a low- 

 perennial herb which bears globose, yellowish or reddish, viscid fruit 

 about the size of a cherry. Each fruit is concealed in a large mem- 

 branous, inflated calyx, which enlarges greatly after flowering. The 

 fruit is fragrant, slightly acid, but not unpleasant to the taste. Two 

 other species (Physalis Alkekengi and Physalis Peruviana) are some- 

 times cultivated under the name "strawberry tomato," and these 

 occasionally spring up spontaneously in gardens and waste places. 



The nettle tree (Ceilts occidentalis), which is also called hackberry 

 and sugar berry, is related to the elms, but it bears a berry-like fruit 

 about the size of a pea. This is purplish red when ripe, and though its 

 pulp is thin it is juicy, sweet and edible. In some parts of the State 

 this tree is quite scarce, but it is not rare in the lower part of the 

 valley of the Hudson river. 



The red mulberry (Morus rubra) is a shrub or small tree related 

 botanically to the famous tropical bread-fruit tree. Its flowers are 

 very small and aggregated in a short cylindrical spike which becomes 

 fleshy and juicy in fruit, resembling somewhat a blackberry in shape 

 and size, but it is of a dark purplish color when ripe. It is sweetish 

 and edible and was long ago employed by the Indians as food. The 

 tree is now rather scarce within our limits. 



