**2.5 Species and varieties**

The cultivated plums belong to two species:

1.*Prunus domestica* (European plum). It is a hybrid of diploid myrobalan plum (*Prunus cerasifera*) and tetraploid black thorn (*Prunus spinosa*). It is hexaploid in shape. Fruits are larger in size than Japanese plums. Fruit is oval or round having both yellow and green ground colour and also both red and blue skin colour. The cultivated varieties of European plum are classified into three main groups:

