Accurately speaking, the hometown of "American Almond" is not in the United States. Its nickname is Almond, also known as padan apricot, which belongs to Prunus of Rosaceae and is native to Central and Western Asia. Xinjiang is also one of China's producing areas, distributed in Tacheng, Yumin, Gong Liu, Hotan, Kashgar and other places.
Padan apricot has a long history of cultivation in Europe and has become an important dried fruit resource with a wide variety. Its kernel contains 5 1.5% of oil, protein, sugar, inorganic salts and multivitamins. Besides being eaten as dried fruit, it is also a valuable raw material for making sweets, cakes, cosmetics and medicines. Known as the "Prince of Dried Fruit".
Padan apricot is a medium-sized tree with a height of 4 ~ 8m, straight trunk, beautiful crown, smooth branches and light brown branchlets. In spring, the chill is not over, and padan apricot is full of tree buds. After a night of spring rain, the buds quietly open, and the white or pale pink petals are shaped like peach blossoms. In summer, countless small green fruits are hidden in long, narrow and lanceolate green leaves. In autumn, apricot-like fruit is ripe, and the flesh is bitter and astringent, so no one will patronize it. Gradually, the flesh cracked, revealing a stone full of honeycomb holes, but there was a treasure-Bataan almond, which was of high quality and high price.
Padan apricot is drought-tolerant and cold-tolerant, and it is easy to breed. It can not only graft branches, but also cultivate seedlings with seeds. Its seedlings grow fast and bear fruit early. When the seedlings form flower buds that year, they can bear fruit the next year. In recent years, it has been cultivated in the sandy land of Hexi Corridor in Shaanxi, Ningxia and Gansu.
Padan apricot has beautiful trees and beautiful flowers to watch. Wood is of good quality and can be used to make small furniture. It can be used as the rootstock of drupe trees in fruit tree cultivation. Nuts have important economic value and are one of the excellent tree species worth popularizing in sandy areas.