Summer field notes
Cold Hardy Plums and Cherry Hybrids: Summer Field Notes
Field note · August 2026
Purple leaf chokecherry selection
picking these purple leafed chokecherries today, they're an early ripening variety with large purple leaves, a very vigorous upright growth habit, and in contrast to the other reddish leafed chokecherries we grow, these have a black skin and unique tasting green flesh - they have a savory grassy taste like in between chokecherry and goji.. maybe it's just because they're unripe, but there does seem to be unique flavour. The cultivar labelled as Lee Red, a Canadian introduction. The common purple ones you can find in landscaping are an Schubert, which ripen later. Canada Red is a sport of schubert and just has slightly redder leaves. Midnight also has purple leaves, but smaller fruit. I would like to collect more chokecherry cultivars they grow well here and I'm just impressed at the surprising amount of variation.