The Trees at Keele
Black Mulberry Morus nigra
No photograph available
A broad-crowned small deciduous tree with heart-shaped dark green leaves to 12cm in length, turning yellow in autumn. Flowers insignificant, greenish; fruits 2cm in length, dark purplish-red, edible. Mulberry is the food of the silkworm but there are two species and it is the White Mulberry that the silkworms eat and not the Black. It is well known that King James 1 wanted to wrest the production of silk from the French and imported ten thousand mulberries to feed the silkworms on. Unfortunately he imported Black instead of White!
Location: two in the Memorial Garden; square K11; tags 0042 planted in 2016 and 0049 planted in 2017.