Malus sylvestris Crab Apple

A small deciduous tree which is usually spiny with hairless leaves and twigs and produces smaller apples than the cultivated apple. It is a species of ancient hedges and woodland and it is almost always found as a single tree where it occurs. It survives despite the fact that the natural dispersal of its fruits and seeds, presumably by animals, is probably quite rare. The status of Crab Apple in the British Flora is not clear mainly due to confusion with the domestic apple, Malus domestica which frequently occurs naturalised. Stace's New Flora of the British Isles states that morphological intermediates between Malus sylvestris and Malus domestica are frequent although molecular evidence indicates that both are distinct species and that hybridisation between them is rare. Arthur Chater's excellent Flora of Cardiganshire (2010) provides an inciteful discussion of the problems associated with identifying and recording this species. Many records of Crab Apple in West Glamorgan are likely to be misidentifications, so the distribution map provided here is not entirely accurate. Both Malus sylvestris and Malus domestica are mapped together in the BSBI Atlas.

Native