• Skip to primary navigation
  • Skip to main content
TCV logo

How To Grow Trees

  • Search
  • News
  • Contact
  • Donate
MENUMENU
  • Grow trees
        • Collecting tree seed
        • Extracting tree seed
        • Pretreatment
        • Sowing your tree seeds
        • Growing
        • Transplanting
        • Planting
        • All tree recipes
        • Alder
        • Ash
        • Aspen
        • Downy birch
        • Bird cherry
        • Blackthorn
        • Crab apple
        • Dog Rose
        • Elder
        • Goat willow
        • Gorse
        • Guelder rose
        • Grey willow
        • Hawthorn
        • Hazel
        • Holly
        • Juniper
        • Pedunculate oak
        • Sessile oak
        • Rowan
        • Scots pine
        • Silver birch
        • Spindle
        • Wild cherry
        • Wych elm
  • Identify trees
        • Alder
        • Aspen
        • Ash
        • Bird cherry
        • Blackthorn
        • Crab apple
        • Dog rose
        • Downy birch
        • Elder
        • Goat willow
        • Gorse
        • Guelder rose
        • Grey willow
        • Hawthorn
        • Hazel
        • Holly
        • Juniper
        • Rowan
        • Pedunculate oak
        • Sessile oak
        • Scots pine
        • Silver birch
        • Spindle
        • Wild cherry
        • Wych elm
  • About
  • Support us

How to identify Blackthorn

Scientific Name: Prunus spinosa

Family: Rose

Scientific Family: Rosaceae

How to grow Blackthorn

Share59
Tweet
Pin21

Blackthorn is a very thorny shrub. It makes a good hedgerow plant (together with hawthorn, gorse and holly) as it creates impenetrable thickets and therefore provides good protection for a whole range of wildlife. Many plants grow beneath it as they are protected from grazing animals. Birds build their nests among its branches and small mammals like hedgehogs find safe shelter below its dense canopy.

The threatened Black Hairstreak (Satyrium pruni) butterfly lays its eggs in thickets of Blackthorn where they overwinter. The caterpillars emerge in spring.

Black hairstreak (Satyrium pruni) female laying egg by Charles J Sharp [CC BY-SA 4.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0)]

Leaves

The leaves are small and slender (widest above halfway), alternate and oval in shape, tapering to a point at the tip. They are a dull, dark – sometimes sticky above and hairy on the veins beneath. The leaves open after the flowers.

Blackthorn leaf
A blackthorn leaf

Flowers

The flowers are white and appear early – between March and May – before the leaves. They have 5 petals, either singularly or in pairs on the stems and often occur in huge numbers. They are one of the first sources of nectar and pollen for insects that emerge early in the spring.

Clusters of blackthorn flowers
Clusters of blackthorn flowers

Fruits

The fruits, called sloes, are bluish-black ‘drupes’, often with a waxy coating. The fruit is round, between 1 and 1.5cm long, and contains one large stone and, normally, not much flesh.

They are rich in vitamin C, but very sour to taste. They sometimes sweeten after the first frost and remain for a long time on the plant – good winter food for birds and mammals.

The fruits of the blackthorn
The fruits of the blackthorn, known as ‘sloes’

Bark

The twigs are black and spiny with leaf buds along the spines, which are formed from shoots. The wood is dense and hard-wearing. It was traditionally used for making tool parts and walking sticks. It makes good firewood.

When the plant is old then the bark becomes very dark – almost black.

The bark of a blackthorn
The bark of a blackthorn

Habitat

Blackthorn grows in hedges, on rocks and in woodland. As a shrub it grows up to 3m in height.

It thrives in full sun and grows in all kinds of soil, although it prefers a soil rich in lime. The only soil it doesn’t like is very acid – like peat, where it will not grow.

Blackthorn protects soil from erosion and is used as a barrier against the wind.

Blackthorn growing in a wild landscape
Blackthorn growing in the Marble Arch Caves Geopark, County Fermanagh

More about conservation

Learn the art of dry stone walling, woodland management, tree planting, hedgelaying and much more. Advice, instructions and support to manage your countryside and green spaces

The definitive ‘how to’ conservation guides

  • Keep in touch
    • Find TCV
    • Contact us
    • Blogs
    • Newsletter
  • Join in, feel good
    • Volunteer with TCV
    • Green Gym
    • Careers
    • Partner with TCV
  • Information
    • About us
    • Safeguarding
    • Privacy policy
    • Terms and conditions
  • Resources
    • Conservation Handbooks
    • Grow your own trees (this site)

© Copyright 2021 The Conservation Volunteers

Registered in England as a limited company (976410) and as a charity in England (261009) and Scotland (SCO39302)
Registered Office: Sedum House, Mallard Way, Doncaster DN4 8DB

Fundraising Regulator logo

Website by Made in Trenbania