The date of first flowers on the cherry plum is variable, but it is a good marker of an early or late season. If the cherry plum shows first flowers in January, the season is ahead of normal, but if they do not open until well into February, the year is late.

The cherry plum is more widely known as purple plum because it is mostly the purple-leaved forms that are grown. But the type species has green leaves and white flowers and is a pretty tree, sometimes seen in gardens. The purple kinds have very pale pink or slightly deeper pink flowers, depending on variety.

The two common purple kinds are Prunus cerasifera ‘Pissardii’, which has purple-red leaves and flowers that are pink in bud but open very pale pink and turn white, and ‘Nigra’, which has darker foliage and pink buds that open to soft pink flowers. There are many other varieties of this lovely garden tree, such as ‘Thundercloud’, which has brown leaves and pink flowers, but few of these varieties, or even the basic green form with white flowers, are offered for sale.

The flowers are quickly followed by the opening leaves, but have the branches to themselves for about two weeks. As the last flowers fall, the leaves take over in a swirl of bronze-purple, turning deeper later.

Cherry plum is very easy to grow and very hardy; it originated in Asia Minor and the Caucasus. It makes a tree of ideal size for gardens, not too big and of good shape. Its purple-red foliage is a fine backdrop for a range of shrubs and flowers. If pruning is necessary, it will tolerate it better than most of the cherry family, which typically tend to succumb to disease when pruned — the pruning cuts allowing disease entry.