The linden tree is a tree that has been closely linked to human history for centuries. It provides shade, comfort and community and valuable tea or honey from the flowers. But what about the fruits? Let's get on their trail.
Are the fruits of the linden tree edible?
The fruits of the linden tree are edible nuts that appear in small, round shapes after flowering. The edible fruits have a soft consistency and contain oily pulp. The edible types of linden trees include the winter linden tree and the Crimean linden tree.
What the linden tree offers us
The linden tree is one of the most common trees - with its role as a meeting center on village squares, as an avenue border or as a light source of shade in parks and gardens, it has always been a loyal companion to people. Its sweet-smelling flowers, which appear from May to July, are also a sensual and healing gift of the linden tree - you can use it to make a tasty, cold-fighting and sleep-inducing tea, and beekeepers let their bees use it to make one of the most popular types of honey. All of these are the well-known things that we receive as gifts from the Linde:
- Classic socializing center (village tree)
- friendly shade provider
- Avenue border
- fragrant flowers for tea and honey
But the fruits can also be useful to people. Many people believe that after flowering, the linden tree's usable material has been grazed for the season. But far from it. Although it is less well known, the fruits of the linden tree are edible. So you can certainly get them out of the shadow of the popular flowers! But first let's talk about biology.
Appearance and other characteristics of the fruits
The fruits that form on the linden tree after flowering are nuts that appear in small, round shapes. Depending on the type of linden tree, the fruits look a little different - and not all of them are actually edible. All linden fruits are characterized by a narrow bract - this serves as a kind of flying sail with which the ripe fruit is carried further away. This expands the distribution radius of the linden tree.
Here is an overview of the fruits of the most common species in this country:
Summer linden tree
The fruits of the large-leaved summer linden tree are five-sided and spherical to elongated and reach a length of about one centimeter. They are greenish-yellowish, slightly gray in color and have a felty coating.
Winterlinde
The nuts of the small-leaved winter linden tree are brown and also covered with felt. Their consistency is much softer than that of summer linden fruits - especially when young, they are easy to eat with their oil-containing pulp. Basically, the softness of the fruit is a reliable indication of edibility - even with the many cross-breeding individuals in the wild.
Silver lime tree
The fruits of the silver linden tree with their silvery light undersides of the leaves are light green and completely spherical.
Krimlinde
The color of the Crimean linden fruits is, similar to that of the summer linden fruits, greenish-brownish-grayish. The size is also similar, but the shape is a little rounder.
Propagation via the fruits
The linden tree naturally also reproduces generatively via the seeds contained in the fruit. However, it also has other methods up its sleeve by which it reproduces, such as vegetatively via cane rash or root spawn. With a lot of patience, a linden tree can also be grown from a seed.
