Sour cherry or Wild cherry: how to tell them apart?
Sour cherry and Wild cherry look alike and are often mixed up. Here is how to tell them apart, feature by feature, with their photos and the details to look for.
⚡ The quick answer
Sour cherry
Prunus cerasus
Wild cherry
Prunus avium
The wild cherry has sweet fruits and a straighter, more slender trunk; the sour cherry remains bushier, with sour fruits.
🍃 Leaves
Elliptic to obovate, toothed, dark green, smaller than those of the wild cherry
Ovate, toothed, tapering tip, two reddish glands at the base of the leaf blade
🌸 Flowers
White, in small umbels, appearing early in spring
Large white flowers in small clusters, very abundant
🍎 Fruits
Small bright red, tart drupe (morello cherry)
Small dark red to black cherries, bitter
🪵 Bark
Reddish-brown, marked with horizontal lenticels
Glossy reddish-brown, peeling in horizontal bands
📏 Size
3 to 6 m tall
15 to 25 m tall
🗺️ Habitat
Orchards and gardens
Open woodland, woodland edges, rich soils
⚠️ Toxicity
Fruit flesh edible and tart; stone, leaves and bark contain amygdalin (a cyanide precursor), toxic in large quantities
Leaves, bark and stones contain cyanogenic glycosides, toxic if swallowed in large quantity; the flesh of the fruit is harmless
🔎 And from the Wild cherry side
Wild cherry has sweet fruit and a straighter, more slender trunk; sour cherry stays more bushy, with sour fruit.
🌿 Go further
Want to practise spotting these details on real photos? Floraneo offers profiles and quizzes for dozens of look-alike species.
ℹ️ Educational profile — do not use it to judge whether a plant is edible or safe.