European Olive (Olea Europaea)

The European Olive Tree is a variety of small tree that belongs to the Oleaceae family. This tree variety is cultivated in several places and measured naturalized in many countries. These high survival rate trees are cultivated extensively in California and Arizona as ornamentals. This tree is an evergreen tree or plant that is native to Africa, Asia and the Mediterranean. The European Olive Tree has a slow growth rate, and it grows well in full sun. This tree variety grows in all kinds of soil, including moist and well-drained soils. Once established, the European Olive Tree can be an extraordinary conversation piece or resource of olives. Unrefined olives are unpalatable, but mature olives can be hard-pressed for oil. When juvenile, these trees often need staking and customary annual pruning. When the tree is well-grown, it attains a spreading, circular or horizontal shape.

Features

A matured European Olive Tree is capable of attaining a height that ranges from 30 feet to 40 feet, with the widespread branches that spread between 30 feet and 40 feet, with equally huge trunk diameters.

The leaves of the tree are oblong, with silvery green in color and there will be a slight change in their color during the fall. The length of the leaves ranges from 4cm to 10 cm, with a breadth between 1 cm and 3 cm.

The European Olive Tree produces flowers during the spring season. These flowers are smaller in size, and white colored fluffy ones, with ten-cleft corolla and calyx, bifid stigma and two stamens.

The fruits of the tree are smaller in size with the length between 1 cm and 2.5 cm, with small size seeds.

Uses

The European Olive Tree is chiefly cultivated for fine wood, olive oil, olive fruit and the olive leaf. 90% of the yielded olives are used for oil, whereas about 10% of them are employed as table olives. The oil of the tree is the foundation of the healthy Mediterranean diet.

The lifespan of the European Olive Tree ranges from 300 years to 600 years.