Plant · P-378

Medlar

Crataegus germanica

Medlar's fruit is rock-hard and sour until it is picked late in autumn and left to blett - softening and browning until it turns sweet enough to eat raw or cook into jelly. The small, crooked-limbed tree has been grown across Europe since antiquity and flowers later than most orchard trees, feeding pollinators after the spring rush has passed. It also shrugs off the fireblight and rust that plague apples, pears and quince, so it works well as a low-input stand-in for them rather than planted beside them. One tree is enough - it is self-fertile and can start bearing in as little as three years.