Crab Apple - Malus sylvestris

Shrub or tree to 10 metres. Flowers pinkish or white 30 to 40 mm in rounded clusters, fragrant. Fruit the familiar apple but smaller than the domestic apple, usually yellow or yellow/green. Under surfaces of leaves and the petioles are hairless.

Orchard Apple (Malus pumila) is similar but has hairy leaf undersurfaces and petioles and larger fruit, whereas Crab Apple (Malus sylvestris) has glabrous leaves, small fruits (often yellow) and occasional thorns.

Photos help with confirming an ID, particularly if they show the small yellow fruits, but you should also add a comment to note if the leaves and petioles are glabrous (hairless).

Woods and hedgerows.

May to June.

Deciduous.

Quite common in most of Britain.

Quite common in Leicestershire and Rutland. In the 1979 Flora survey of Leicestershire it was found in 494 of the 617 tetrads.