!. Soft red berries growing on vine. 2. Hard berries growing on tree. 3. Smaller hard berries growing on tree. 4. hard to soft berries growing on bush. Any info is appreciated.. thanks.
Acidity and perhaps a few other unpleasant flavors would be the main deterrents; none would be expected to be poisonous. Small sizes of many would also be a turnoff, orchard apple-sized fruits give you something to sink your teeth into. "Inedible", as opposed to "unpalatable" carries an implication of being harmful if eaten.
Well, they can be somewhat harmful - eating a lot of raw crabapples can give you unpleasant stomach cramps (just the same as eating unripe orchard apples does). Not life-threatening at all, but not at all nice, either. Not sure what the cause is, but cooking stops it from happening.
Knocking fresh ones back by the handful unlikely. Local native Oregon crabapple (Malus fusca) - another one with small, tart fruits - placed in wood boxes and left in cold water to become old and soft by local Indians (First Nations peoples, in Canada) according to Pojar & Mackinnon native plants guidebook.
Sounds very like the old European tradition of bletting (light frosting / incipient decay) of Mespilus germanica and Sorbus domestica fruit to make them more palatable. Has a similar effect to cooking.
Yes, it seems like it. I once drove a retired arboretum employee down to the Seattle arboretum so he could pick up old medlar fruits from beneath the tree there. He made jam out of them, it tasted like apricot jam. I haven't tried anything made form Sorbus domestica yet.
Thanks everyone. I am learning so much about many plants & trees from all of you. I actually didn't realize just how many different varieties of crabapples there were untill I started to look them up.
At one point it was claimed 500 kinds had been introduced in North America over the years. While not all of these will have been on the market or even prevalent in collections or old gardens all at the same time, new ones continue to be named and put into circulation.
