Cherry blossom (sakura)

A festival of one week's beauty

Sakura is Japan's flowering cherry. In spring the whole tree is wrapped in pink flowers — so beautiful that Japanese people hold a festival under the trees ('hanami'). But the flowers last only a week and fall like snow. Sakura fruits aren't edible — the tree is just for beauty. There are sakura trees in Tashkent too!

The Japanese cherry (Prunus serrulata) and its 200+ cultivars are a symbol of Japanese culture. The most famous cultivar, 'Somei Yoshino', consists of clones of a single parent tree, so all bloom at once. The blossom wave ('sakura front') starts in Okinawa in March and reaches Hokkaido in May; meteorologists forecast it like weather. The hanami tradition dates from the 8th century; the flower's short life expresses the Buddhist idea of 'mono no aware' — the beauty of impermanence. Due to warming, Kyoto's bloom has shifted to the earliest dates in 1,200 years of records (2021: 26 March). In 1912 Japan gave 3,000 sakura trees to the USA.

Fun facts

• In Japan, sakura blooming is forecast on TV like the weather.
• All 'Somei Yoshino' sakura trees are copies of a single tree.
• Kyoto has recorded sakura bloom dates for 1,200 years — the world's longest nature record.