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Aronia bush
snowy43
Posts: 118
in Fruit & veg
Have been given a small Aronia fruit bush. Know about about its properties, but what kind of soil does it need to be planted in, as I have bought a large pot for it. My local nursery told me the size of the pot, but had no idea what it was!
Is it the same family as a blueberry?
0
Posts
They are very tolerant of soild pH but prefer it very slightly acid. I would use 90% John Innes #3 with 10% ericaceous. I have two growing in my borders in improved clay and they are doing well. The berries will make your eyes water though! 'Superfruit' they may be but best mixed with other fruits and used in preserves or cooking in my opinion. The autumn leaf colour is spectacular if rather short lived.
The seeds inside the fruit contain cyanide which make them rather bitter. We boil the fruit, then strain it through muslin to remove the seeds. The juice is then used to make a rather nice Jam. Can be a bit 'tannin' tasting for some folks, but I like it.
And the blackbirds adore the fruit, so we have to grow it in a fruit cage or we would get nothing.
Chokeberry is its common name by the way.
Thanks for your help; will plant it tomorrow. Have a fruit cage and there's space for the pot in it.
My Polish dil says they make jam with it.
They thrived in very acid sandy soil [planted as ornamentals] at a place where I used to work and produced heavy crops of dark purple berries. Due to the name Chokeberry I never thought of them as edible and neither did the birds, they were left on the plants into the winter.