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Photinia
Also called Christmas Berries
Photinia is a genus of about 30 species of evergreen and deciduous small trees and large shrubs in the rose family, grown mainly for glossy foliage and red berries. Common garden types include Photinia x fraseri and its 'Red Robin' cultivar, grown for bright red new leaves.
Photinia () is a genus of about 30 species of small trees and large shrubs, but the taxonomy has recently varied greatly, with the genera Heteromeles, Stranvaesia and Aronia sometimes included in Photinia.
They are a part of the rose family (Rosaceae) and related to the apple. The botanical genus name derives from the Greek word φωτεινός / phōteinós for "shiny" and refers to the often glossy leaves. Most species are evergreen, but deciduous species also occur. The small apple-shaped fruit has a size of 4 to 12 mm and forms in large quantities. They ripen in the fall and often remain hanging on the bush until well into the winter. The fruits are used as food by birds, which excrete the seeds with their droppings and thereby distribute the plant.
Some varieties of Photinia are toxic due to the presence of cyanogenic glycosides in the vacuoles of foliage and fruit cells. When the leaves are chewed these compounds are released and are rapidly converted to hydrogen cyanide (HCN) which blocks cellular respiration. The amount of HCN produced varies considerably between taxa, and is in general greatest in young leaves. Ruminants are particularly affected by cyanogenic glycosides because the first stage of their digestive system (the rumen) provides better conditions for liberating HCN than the stomachs of monogastric vertebrates.
Photinia are susceptible to leaf blight caused by the bacterium Erwinia amylovora.
Photinias are very popular ornamental shrubs, grown for their fruit and foliage. Numerous hybrids and cultivars are available; several of the cultivars are selected for their strikingly bright red young leaves in spring and summer. The most widely planted are:
Text excerpted from the Wikipedia article Photinia by its contributors, under CC BY-SA 4.0; the excerpts and the care summary drawn from them are shared under the same licence.
The care summary was written by AI (Claude, Anthropic) from the sources on this page, with general growing knowledge where they are silent. Check before relying on it.
