Wellington

Wellington is an old American Morus alba cultivar that originated in Geneva, New York, on the property of Richard Wellington, a pomologist associated with the New York State Agricultural Experiment Station. It is one of the historic named mulberries, selected in an era when the species was still being evaluated seriously for fruit rather than treated as a weed tree, and it survives in the trade because it is a genuinely heavy and dependable cropper. California Rare Fruit Growers lists it among the standard cultivars, describing reddish-black medium-sized fruit of good flavour and quality. The fruit is distinctly cylindrical rather than tapering, a shape that makes the cultivar recognisable in the hand. Whitman Farms, Raintree, Cricket Hill Garden and Planting Justice continue to offer it, chiefly to growers who want a reliable, hardy, historically documented tree rather than the largest possible berry.