Plant · P-410

Sour Orange

Citrus × aurantium

Sour Orange is a processing fruit rather than a dessert one - the raw fruit is very bitter, so the yield is marmalade and preserves, rind for flavouring cake, and flowers distilled into neroli oil for perfumery. It is hardier than sweet orange and, armed with spines, is often grown as a clipped hedge that doubles as a barrier planting. It is also the standard disease-resistant rootstock for sweet orange, more soil-tolerant than trifoliate orange though less cold-hardy.