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Tafoni on a slab of exposed bedrock beside the golden cherry bush. It recalls the mind warp rock n’ roll nightmare of Rich Kids on LSD and the bubbles on their Reactivate album cover.
“Of all our native shrubs, there is none more beautiful than this wild cherry with its rich, deep green holly-like foliage and sprays of white flowers.”
—Theodore Payne, California Native Plants, (1941)
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Golden cherries ripening riverside in October, 2024.
Never had I seen a holly-leaf cherry, Prunus ilicifolia, with golden fruit until we spied this bush clinging to a fractured bedrock outcrop, overlooking the Wild and Scenic Sisquoc River.
It’s not uncommon to see some cherries with patches of yellowish or golden hues as they ripen.
Most generally, however, the cherries ripen to a deep burgundy or plum color, almost black when at their best. “Red to blue-black,” as listed by the University of California Jepson Herbaria.
I regularly eat mountain cherries seasonally when walking the wildlands of Santa Barbara County.
The fruit is sweet and with good flavor profile; a rarity in the forest. If less than fully ripe they may hit the palate with a tinge of astringency.
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Sisquoc River serenity.
When in the way out of Condor National Forest—meant by Craig Childs as a far-off place, as in way out there, not a trail leading out—these juicy and sugary wild fruits are a big score, when all I have with me is what little I can carry, “self-contained, a kind of casual turtle carrying his house on his back.”
Although there is only a slim layer of fruit pulp to enjoy, and a massive seed stone to spit out, it’s still very much worth eating as a tasty treat.
The skin tastes pleasant, too, not like that tart bite characteristic of, for example, Burbank’s Santa Rosa plum.
And this waxen seed sheath provides the added benefit of fiber, which offers a small shot of sustained energy.
The cherries ripen in timely fashion, during the height of the forest’s hottest, driest time, in September and October.
A ten minute’s respite trailside nibbling wild cherries is rather enjoyable at this time of season, in a land of meager provisions and a dearth of sweetness and juice.
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Related Post:
Sisquoc Falls: A Little Known Region In California Explored (1884)
