The World of Apples

Wild apples

Malus asiatica Nakai

Chinese pearleaf crabapple

Description

Malus asiatica is a small tree, 4 to 6 m tall. Its leaves are ovate or elliptic, 5–11 cm long and densely finely hairy beneath. The flowers, 3–4 cm across, have pinkish petals and open in April and May in China; the fruit is yellow or red, egg-shaped or roundish and 4–5 cm across, ripening there in August and September. Plants with 34, 51 and 68 chromosomes have been counted1.

It is altogether a hairier plant than its close relative Malus prunifolia, with smaller flowers, shorter and hairier sepals, usually pinkish rather than white petals and larger fruit2.

Range and habitat

It grows on open slopes and the sandy soils of plains, from sea level to 2,800 m, in provinces from Xinjiang and Liaoning to Yunnan and Zhejiang1. It is nowhere truly a wild plant, though it has gone wild in places, and Ernest Wilson found what seemed to be wild trees in western Hubei2. The IUCN Red List assessed it in 2014 as Data Deficient3.

Relationship to the cultivated apple

It is a famous fruit tree of northern and north-eastern China, and long cultivation has produced many varieties that differ in the shape, colour and size of their fruit and in their season1. Soft apples of this kind, Malus asiatica and Malus prunifolia among them, have been grown in China as dessert apples for more than 2,000 years5, eaten fresh or dried2. A genome study in 2017 found that both are very likely hybrids between the Siberian crab apple, Malus baccata, and the Asian wild apple, Malus sieversii, from Kazakhstan5: an eastern counterpart of the orchard apple, which arose when the wild apple travelled west and met the European crab apple2.

Takanoshin Nakai described the species in 1915 from trees grown in Japan. It was in European gardens by 1850, apparently introduced from Japan by Philipp von Siebold, and it is very susceptible to scab2.

Where the sources disagree

  • What it is. Plants of the World Online and Trees and Shrubs Online keep it as a species4,2. A genome study treats it as a hybrid of the Siberian crab apple and the Asian wild apple5, while an earlier genetic analysis found it indistinguishable from the Asian wild apple6. The 2022 revision of the genus counts it among the cultivated apples rather than the 26 wild species7.
  • Wild or not. Plants of the World Online gives it a native range in China4; Trees and Shrubs Online says it is nowhere truly wild2.

Sources

  1. Malus asiatica, Flora of China vol. 9, Gu Cuizhi and Stephen A. Spongberg, Flora of China, eFloras.org, 2003. Supports: the description (small tree 4–6 m, leaves 5–11 cm, densely puberulous beneath, flowers 3–4 cm, petals pinkish, pome yellow or red, 4–5 cm, flowering April–May and fruiting August–September, 2n = 34, 51, 68); open slopes and sandy plains from sea level to 2,800 m in the provinces listed; "a famous fruit tree in N and NE China", with many cultivars differing in shape, colour, size and ripening time.
  2. Malus asiatica, Julian Sutton and Nick Dunn, Trees and Shrubs Online (International Dendrology Society), 2021. Supports: "Nowhere truly a wild plant"; naturalised in places, and found apparently wild in western Hubei by Ernest Wilson; differences from M. prunifolia (smaller flowers, shorter and hairier sepals, usually pinkish petals, larger fruit, hairier leaves); molecular support for its origin by hybridisation of M. sieversii and M. baccata; soft-fruited apples of this kind grown in northern China for at least 2,000 years, eaten fresh or dried; described in 1915 by Takanoshin Nakai from Japanese cultivation; in European cultivation by 1850, apparently from Japan through Siebold; severe susceptibility to scab; the garden name M. prunifolia var. rinki.
  3. Malus asiatica, The IUCN Red List of Threatened Species 2016: e.T18770855A47600700, L. Rhodes and N. Maxted, 2016. Supports: Data Deficient, assessed 1 May 2014; population trend unknown; the common name Chinese pearleaf crabapple.
  4. Malus asiatica Nakai, Plants of the World Online, Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew. Supports: accepted name and authority, published 1915; native range given as China (north-central and south-eastern China, Inner Mongolia, Manchuria, Qinghai, Xinjiang), introduced in Korea.
  5. Genome re-sequencing reveals the history of apple and supports a two-stage model for fruit enlargement, Naibin Duan and others, Nature Communications 8: 249, 2017. Supports: M. asiatica and M. prunifolia very likely hybrids between M. baccata and M. sieversii from Kazakhstan; Chinese soft apples, M. asiatica and M. prunifolia among them, cultivated as dessert apples for more than 2,000 years.
  6. The domestication and evolutionary ecology of apples, Amandine Cornille and others, Trends in Genetics 30(2): 57–65; Wageningen University repository, 2014. Supports: admixture analyses showing M. asiatica, "the apple formerly cultivated in China", indistinguishable from M. sieversii.
  7. A revision of the genus Malus Mill. (Rosaceae), Jing-chao Li, Jian-quan Liu and Xin-fen Gao, European Journal of Taxonomy 853: 1–127, 2022. Supports: M. asiatica named, with M. domestica, as a species cultivated for its fruit; not among the 26 wild species recognised.