Prunus mahaleb L.
Cerasus mahaleb (L.) Mill.
Eng.: St. Lucie cherry, mahaleb cherry. Spa.: Cerezo de Santa Lucía. Fre.: Cerisier de Sainte-Lucie. Ara.: Mahaleb, mahleb, el bergug.
Small tree, deciduous, hermaphrodite, up to 8(12) m in height, irregular in shape, with generally well defined trunk, slightly tortuous and ± extended branches and very fragrant wood. Bark of trunk and old branches smooth, slightly fissured, brown-greyish. Young branchlets hairy, green, turning brown or greyish. Leaves [(1.5)2-6(8) × 1.5-4(6) cm] alternate, oval-suborbicular, obtuse or acute, sometimes acuminate, rounded or cordate at the base; margin with glandular teeth, glabrous on both sides or sometimes slightly hairy on the underside, with ± similar green shade on both sides. Inflorescence in short corymbiform racemes of 3-12 flowers. Flower 10-15 mm in diameter, on a glabrous pedicel 4-20 mm. Calyx with 5 green and glabrous sepals, oval-oblong, about 2 mm long. Corolla with 5 white, oval-orbicular petals, about 5-6 mm long, with entire or emarginate tip. Stamens numerous (about 20), with white filaments and yellow anthers. Fruit a subglobose and small drupe (6-10 mm diameter), greenish-yellowish at first and finally blackish, glabrous, shiny. Seed ovoid-rounded with smooth surface.
Flowering:
April to May.
Fruiting:
July to September.
Habitat:
Forests, hedges and rocky outcrops on calcareous mountains. Reaching almost 2,000 m in altitude in the limestone mountains of the central High Atlas. In subhumid to humid bioclimate, on thermomediterranean to supramediterranean floors.
Distribution:
Central-southern Europe and west Asia. It North Africa it is distributed only in Morocco, in forests and rocky outcrops of the western Rif, Middle Atlas and High Atlas. Sauvage (1949) cited 2 major populations in Itegui and Ait Yub (1,600-1,800 m) on the northern slope of Tizi-n-Test (High Atlas).
Conservation status:
Rare but widely distributed species, does not seem threatened. In the IUCN Red List of Threatened Species it is listed as Least Concern (LC) at global level (Rhodes & Maxted, 2016).