Illustrated Japanese Culture

Sakura: flowering cherries, seasons and cultivation

桜（さくら）

Sakura is the Japanese collective name for flowering cherries and their blossoms. These rose-family trees include wild species and cultivated forms selected for their flowers and growth habits. Somei-yoshino is one cultivar within this diversity.

Sakura: flowering cherries, seasons and cultivation — Top: Somei-yoshino flowers before its leaves expand. Bottom: Yamazakura often flowers alongside emerging reddish-brown leaves.

01Species, cultivar and clone describe different kinds of relationship.

02Somei-yoshino’s spring flowering depends on winter chilling followed by warmth.

03Cherry flowers, leaves, fruit, wood and bark have distinct uses.

Look beyond the pink flowers

Species and cultivars

Wild species form natural populations; cultivars are selected forms kept in cultivation. Botanists place flowering cherries in Prunus subgenus Cerasus, or treat Cerasus as a separate genus. Wild cherries occur across the Northern Hemisphere.

Yamazakura: flowers appear with reddish young leaves.

Somei-yoshino: flowers open before the leaves expand.

Flowers with leaves, or before them

Yamazakura and Somei-yoshino give different spring displays: nearly white flowers and reddish young leaves together, or pale pink flowers before the leaves.

Before winterFlower buds form

Winter chillingDormancy is released

Later warmthDevelopment and flowering

Why flowering times differ

For Somei-yoshino’s spring cycle, flower buds form before winter. Sufficient cold releases dormancy; subsequent warmth drives development toward flowering. Other species and cultivars can follow different seasonal patterns.

Keeping a selected form

Grafting joins a selected branch to a rootstock. The branch retains the selected tree’s genetic identity, allowing its flower and growth characteristics to continue in new trees.

Serrated leaf edges and horizontal bark markings

Look at bark and leaves too

Yamazakura typically has five white petals, finely serrated leaves and horizontal bark markings. Identification combines several features, rather than flower colour alone.

Different trees, different flowers

Wild cherries are regional

Yamazakura grows in warmer parts of Japan. Sargent cherry, also called Ōyamazakura or Ezo-yamazakura, occurs in Hokkaido and neighbouring northern regions. In 2018 researchers distinguished Kumano-zakura in the southern Kii Peninsula: a wild species, rather than a newly bred cultivar.

An evolutionary origin is a research inference

A plastome study published in 2023 inferred Cerasus ancestry in the Eastern Mediterranean–Central Asian region, followed by dispersal. This model-based evolutionary account addresses a different question from where a particular Japanese garden cultivar arose.

Double flowers and drooping branches

Yaezakura means double-flowered cherries, rather than one species. Shidare describes drooping branches. Kanzan is a named double-flowered cultivar; Ukon and Gyoikō show how flowers can be yellow-green or a deeper green.

Seeds produce variation

Seedlings combine parental traits. Somei-yoshino trees belong to one grafted clone, so a stand of them may fail to set fruit together. Compatible pollen from other cherries can allow fruiting; the seedlings will not simply copy Somei-yoshino.

Somei-yoshino has hybrid ancestry

Somei-yoshino has ancestry involving Edo-higan and Ōshima cherry. This does not identify its original tree or breeder.

Reading the flowering season

A garden can have several cherry seasons

Shinjuku Gyoen has early cherries, Somei-yoshino and later double-flowered cultivars. Jūgatsuzakura flowers in autumn and spring. Its regular two-season habit differs from occasional autumn rebloom following disturbances such as early leaf loss.

Warming affects two stages

Spring warmth can bring flowering forward, while warmer winters can delay the release of dormancy. In warm regions, insufficient chilling may even disrupt flowering. Research on Somei-yoshino in Sapporo, Tsukuba and Fukuoka cautions against one simple prediction for all Japan.

Opening

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5–6 flowers on the sample tree

Full bloom

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About 80% or more open

What opening and full bloom mean

JMA records opening when five or six flowers open on a designated sample tree; full bloom means about 80% or more are open. These observations do not describe every local tree. JMA ended its flowering forecasts in 2009 but continues observations; private weather services issue forecasts.

Animals move the next generation

Birds and mammals carry seeds after eating fruit. Research in three mountain areas found that bears moved many Kasumizakura seeds uphill into cooler conditions. Wild cherry populations depend on forest relationships as well as temperature.

Gardens before the Edo nurseries

HeianGarden cultivation and selection
MuromachiTrees circulate
GraftingSelected traits retained

Heian garden cherries

Heian-period texts record weeping cherries, and yamazakura was cultivated in gardens. These records show that gardeners were already selecting cherries with different forms.

Medieval movement and cultivation

Muromachi texts describe a cherry resembling Ōshima-zakura. Researchers suggest it travelled from Izu through Kamakura to Kyoto.

Edo nurseries and modern planting

Garden booksNames and forms recorded
Edo nurseriesNamed cultivars sold
Arakawa, 1886Cultivars collected

Names in gardening books

Edo gardening books recorded many named cherries. Kadan Kōmoku lists forty names. Nurseries developed and sold varieties; historical names document horticultural diversity, rather than forty botanical species.

Somei-yoshino spreads

Nurseries in Somei sold the cherry later named Somei-yoshino toward the end of Edo. It spread widely during Meiji, when that name was adopted.

1886: collecting older garden forms

Planting along the Arakawa embankment in 1886 preserved cherries from former Edo residences. Collections retained older garden forms as the city changed.

Viewing and meanings change with context

A print depicting blossom viewing at Ueno, National Diet Library collection.

Blossom viewing becomes a public outing

Hanami is flower viewing, with cherries a familiar focus. Edo planting helped create destinations such as the Sumida embankment and Asukayama. Prints show picnics, music and dancing, though rules varied: Ueno prohibited drinking and music.

Sacred trees at Yoshino

At Yoshino, a tradition says En no Gyōja carved Zaō Gongen in cherry wood. Donations of sacred cherry trees linked planting to mountain religion. This local origin tradition does not explain every blossom-viewing landscape.

A subject for poets

The Heian anthology Kokin Wakashū includes many cherry poems; Saigyō later lived at Yoshino and wrote about its blossoms. Full bloom and falling petals can convey spring beauty, loss or transience. Their meanings depend on the work and its setting.

Falling blossoms in wartime rhetoric

Makiko Nakamoto examines the military song Dōki no Sakura, in which falling blossoms link soldiers and special-attack pilots with death and imagined reunion at Yasukuni Shrine. This is a particular political use of the flower, not its sole meaning.

From a crest motif to a coin

A 19th-century hairpin in the National Theatre collection uses an openwork, three-part sakura crest. Cherry blossoms also appear on the current 100-yen coin. Decorative objects and public emblems give the flower different practical settings.

The name has several proposed origins

Explanations of sakura include saku, “to bloom,” with ra, and an interpretation involving the rice deity’s seat. These remain competing etymological theories.

A tree with several kinds of use

Salted flowers for sakurayu; salted leaves for sakuramochi

Prepared flowers and leaves

Salted cherry flowers, processed with plum vinegar, flavour sweets and sakurayu, a hot-water drink served on celebratory occasions. Salted Ōshima cherry leaves wrap sakuramochi. Coumarin contributes to the processed aroma; too much coumarin can damage the liver, particularly in sensitive people.

Fruit selection and food chemistry

Edible cherries such as Satōnishiki come from sweet cherry. While ornamental cultivars are selected chiefly for flowers, fruit cultivars are selected for their crop. Both belong to the cherry group.

A kernel is different from fruit flesh

Food-cherry kernels contain cyanogenic glycosides that can release poisonous hydrogen cyanide when chewed. The Canadian Food Inspection Agency advises against eating these kernels. Edible flesh does not make the kernel an ordinary food ingredient.

Kabazaiku tea caddy: a cherry-bark surface

Wood and bark are different materials

Cherry timber served furniture and fine-grained printing blocks for ukiyo-e; chips can flavour smoked food. Kakunodate’s kabazaiku uses cherry bark, notably for tea caddies. Ōhi is separately specified pharmaceutical bark material from yamazakura or kasumizakura, rather than a home-treatment instruction.

Twigs and bark supply dyes

Cherry dyeing can use preflowering twigs or bark. Specialist dyers report that the material and collection conditions affect the colour; cherry material does not invariably produce the same pink.

Gum can bind paint

Cherry gum is hardened exudate from damaged bark. The Museum of Fine Arts Boston’s materials database records its identification as a paint binder, a different use from timber or bark craft.

Some planting supplied fuel

Ōshima cherry was also planted for firewood and charcoal. Kumamoto University’s botanical account describes naturalized plantings on coastal hills, showing that people helped shape its distribution.

Protecting individual trees and diverse lineages

1922Protect one named tree
1954 / 1966Park planting and cultivar conservation
PropagationRenew conserved lineages
DNA checksDistinguish names from clones
Mutation breedingSelect a stable new cultivar

The Miharu Takizakura preservation group applying fertiliser, December 2021.

1922: a named tree receives protection

Miharu Takizakura, a weeping cherry, was designated a national natural monument in 1922. The designation applies to this individual tree.

Cherry saplings at Tama Forest Science Garden, renewing the conserved lineages.

Postwar planting and a preservation grove

Koganei Park planted diverse cherries in 1954. In 1966, the decision was made to establish the Tama Forest Science Garden’s cherry preservation grove, collecting older cultivars and clones of important trees.

2011: identification through DNA

DNA research published in 2011 identified Somei-yoshino as a single clone—a genetically identical group propagated from one tree—while some traditional cultivar names covered several clones. Testing could identify young trees before flowering.

Induced variation creates new cultivars

Mutation breeding induces genetic changes, then selects useful results. RIKEN and Ishii Farm treated Gyoikō branches with heavy-ion beams, grafted them and selected a stable pale-yellow form. Announced in 2007, Nishina Zaō is a new cultivar, rather than a newly discovered wild species.

Conservation includes everyday care

Light, soil and pruning

Trees need sunlight, drainage and space for roots and branches. Trampling compacts soil; large pruning wounds can decay. Pruning and health checks should respond to the individual tree.

Recognise different kinds of damage

Fungal witches’ broom produces abnormal, poorly flowering shoots; Somei-yoshino is susceptible. Invasive red-necked longhorn beetle larvae bore into wood and may kill trees. Report signs such as frass to site managers or local authorities so the cause can be assessed.

An overseas collection can help restore another

Japan sent 3,020 cherry trees to Washington in 1912. In 1952, after wartime decline at Arakawa, the US National Park Service returned budwood from descendants of the gift trees to help restore the Tokyo grove.

What can you now explain?

How do a species, a cultivar and a clone differ?

A species is a biological grouping found in natural populations. A cultivar is a selected, named form maintained in cultivation. A clone consists of genetically identical material propagated from one plant; a traditional cultivar name can sometimes include more than one clone.

What do yaezakura and shidare describe?

Yaezakura describes double flowers. Shidare describes drooping branches. Neither term names a single species.

Why can a warmer winter delay dormancy release?

Somei-yoshino buds need enough winter cold to release dormancy. A mild winter can delay that step, even though warmth after dormancy release encourages development toward flowering.

What does JMA’s opening observation measure?

JMA records opening when five or six flowers open on a designated sample tree. Full bloom is about 80% or more. These observations describe the sample tree, rather than every cherry in the area.

How do seeds and grafts preserve or change characteristics?

Seeds combine parental traits and may produce different offspring. Grafting retains the selected branch’s genetic identity, helping preserve its flower and growth characteristics on a new rootstock.

Which parts of a cherry tree have food and material uses?

Prepared flowers and leaves flavour drinks and sweets; edible cherry cultivars are selected for fruit. Wood can supply printing blocks, and bark is used for kabazaiku tea caddies. These are distinct uses of different plant parts.

How do historical settings change the meaning of falling blossoms?

Falling blossoms can evoke loss or transience in a particular poem. Wartime rhetoric also linked them to soldiers’ deaths. The meaning depends on the work, speaker and historical setting, rather than belonging permanently to the flower.

Sources and images

Object and historical images are identified beside the image and sourced below.