Swedish rowan (Sorbus intermediate)
Appearance: A tree that sheds its leaves for winter, reaching average 12-15 m in height, often, however, in the form of a shrub. The crown was quite dangling, in outline roundish-spherical, sometimes even wider, than higher, but always built fairly regularly.
The trunk is relatively short, with dense branches down to the bottom.
Branches often forked and mostly steep, rarely upright or hanging down,
The bark is also smooth on older trees and only broken in a few places by individual ones, wide, scaly cracks, gray or dark gray-purple. Young shoots lilac-woolly pubescent, in the fall, however, they become smoother and more and more naked, initially gray-pink, they darken later. Donuts approx 6-8 mm in length, hairy, dark brownish.
Torsion leaves. quite thin, about the length 6-12 cm, wide to rounded at base, oblong in outline, oval to broadly oval, blunt or only slightly pointed at the front, The front part is indistinct, towards the root – often feathery-lobed, with irregularly serrated tip, Glossy and dark green on top during the foliage season, from underneath – permanently gray, felty.
Flowers in flat style, spreading podbaldachach, reaching approx 10 cm wide. Individual flowers in width 1-2 cm are five pure white or cream, crown round petals and numerous, usually pink stamens.
Apple fruit, roundish-oval, during maturation (since August) gradually change from green to scarlet red, shiny, with a length of approx 1 cm and almost the same width, and sometimes even greater,
Occurrence: Swedish Rowan has been discovered and grows wild in southern Scandinavia, in the North German Lowland, and in Poland on the outskirts. Due to its decorative appearance and its well-known resistance to urban gaseous pollutants, it is more and more often used to fill streets, squares and other communication routes.
Flowering period: Maj.
General thoughts: The Swedish rowan is a spontaneously formed and hereditary fixed rowan hybrid (Sip the onion) with flour rowan (sorbus aria), On careful observation it turns out, that the characteristics of the leaves are intermediate between the two parent species, Felt woolly hair and the outline of the leaf come from the flour rowan, from rowan – still a recognizable tendency to leaf pinnate. Raw fruit is slightly poisonous, edible when heated.
The strong tendency to create hybrids is a very typical feature of many species of the form-rich genus Sorbus. The consequence of this is the creation of more and more new forms, partly related to the emergence of geographic variations, which makes systematic development very difficult. A related species: The Sorbus mougeotri mountain ash tree is similar in appearance, whose leaves go to 10 cm in length and, unlike the Swedish rowan, they are regularly lopsided. The edges are indented on both sides up to 1/8 the width of the lamina. Presumably, it is a rowan hybrid, Widespread in the Alps and Pyrenees. Almost nowhere planted.
Fruits of many species of rowan, in the ripening season they are bright red and therefore are reluctantly eaten by birds or small herbivorous mammals.