Cherry oleaster, better known to gardeners as goumi or cherry silverberry, is an East Asian shrub grown in North America for its sweet but astringent red summer fruit. It has escaped from plantings and been reported growing wild in 12 eastern states.
Appearance
- Growth form
- A deciduous shrub usually 6–10 ft (2–3 m) tall and at least as wide. Young twigs are coated in red-brown scales.
- Leaves
- Oval leaves usually 1.5–2.5 in (4–6 cm) long, up to about 4 in (10 cm), green above and silvery underneath with scattered rusty scales.
- Flowers
- Fragrant, pale yellowish-white flowers, often borne singly, hang from the leaf axils in mid-spring as the new shoots grow.
- Fruit
- Oblong red fruit about 0.5 in (1.2 cm) long, dangling on stalks 0.75–1 in (2–2.5 cm) long. It ripens in mid to late summer and tastes sweet but astringent, somewhat like rhubarb. The thin skin is fragile, which makes the fruit hard to ship and limits it as a commercial crop.
Look-alikes
autumn oliveElaeagnus umbellata
Autumn olive fruit is round, speckled with silvery scales, and ripens from August to November, and its flowers come in clusters of 5–10. Goumi flowers are often single, and its oblong fruit hangs on long stalks and ripens by midsummer.
Why they get mixed upBoth are silvery-leaved Elaeagnus shrubs with red, scale-dotted berries, and autumn olive is a widespread invasive in the eastern US.
Where it lives
- Typical habitats
- Yards and gardens
- Escaped near plantings
- Range
- Native to China, Korea, Japan, and Sakhalin. In the US it is grown as an ornamental and fruit shrub and has become established in parts of the eastern states.
- Preferred conditions
- Like other Elaeagnus, it hosts nitrogen-fixing bacteria in its roots, so it grows well in poor soil.
Life cycle
- Seed dispersal
- Birds can carry the seeds from landscaped yards into natural areas.
Name and classification
- Varieties and forms
- Large-fruited selections such as 'Gigantea' (called Daiogumi in Japan) are grown for their bigger berries.
Conservation
- IUCN Red List
- LCLeast ConcernLow risk of extinction
- Status
- On the Tennessee Invasive Plant Council's Potential Invasives list because birds may spread it from landscaped yards; no wild populations are known in Tennessee yet.
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