Loquat is an evergreen arboreal plant belonging to the genus Loquat, Apple subfamily of Rosaceae, with stout branchlets, embroidered or grayish brown hairs, oblanceolate leaves and grayish brown hairs on petioles. Panicle terminal, calyx tube shallow cup-shaped, fruit spherical or oblong. The flowering period is 10 ~ 12, and the fruiting period is from May to June. Loquat ripens in early summer, with yellow color and sour taste, so it is named because its leaves are shaped like pipa.
Loquat originated in Sichuan and Hubei, China, and is now distributed in the south of the Yangtze River basin, and is mostly cultivated in low mountains, hills and plains. Loquat is suitable for warm and humid climate, and it needs medium or acidic soil with high temperature resistance, salt and alkali tolerance, good drainage and rich humus during its growth and development. The propagation methods of loquat include seed propagation, cutting propagation and grafting propagation.
morphological character
Loquat leaves are leathery, lanceolate, oblanceolate, obovate or oblong. It is 12 ~ 30 cm long and 3 ~ 9 cm wide, and its top is acute or tapered. The base is wedge-shaped or tapered into petiole, the upper edge is serrate, the base is entire, the upper surface is bright and wrinkled, and the lower surface is densely covered with gray-brown fluff, with lateral veins 1 1 ~ 2 1 pair. Petiole short or subsessile, 6 ~ 10 mm long, with gray-brown villi. Stipules subulate, long 1 ~ 1.5 cm, with sharp and hairy tips.
Panicle terminal, long 10 ~ 19 cm, many flowers. Total pedicels and pedicels are rusted, pedicels are 2 ~ 8 mm long, bracts are subulate, 2 ~ 5 mm long and rusted. The flower diameter is1.2 ~ 20mm, the calyx tube is shallow cup-shaped, 4 ~ 5mm long, the sepals are triangular-ovate, 2 ~ 3mm long, the apex is sharp, and there are rusty villi outside the calyx tube and sepals. The fruit is ovoid or nearly spherical, 2 ~ 5 cm in diameter, orange or yellow, with rust-colored fur outside, and soon falls off.