The ornamental plants with edible fruits can play several important functions, ensuring food for the wild animals and embellishing city parks, also these fruits contain high level of bioactive compounds and therefore provide valuable endorsement to the everyday diet. The previous studies of chemical composition of such fruits were fragmentary and superficial. Therefore, the purpose of the study was to analyse the content of major bioactive substances in these fruits.
The experiment was performed at the Laboratory of Division of Organic Food in 2010. The fruits of rowanberry (Sorbus aucuparia L.), flowering quince (Chaenomeles japonica (Thunb.) Lindl. ex Spach), wild rose (Rosa rugosa Thunb.) and berry apple (Malus baccata) were selected for the study. The content of dry matter (by gravimetric method), vitamin C (by colorimetric method), carotenoids and polyphenols (by HPLC) have been determined. The results collected indicate that the fruits of wild rose were characterized by the highest diversity of biologically active compounds among the species examined. At the same time, in these fruits the highest content of vitamin C, lycopene, gallic acid, D-quercetin glucoside, and myricetin has been found compared to the fruits of the other species tested. The highest content of beta-carotene was typical for rowanberry fruits and they contained chlorogenic and caffeic acids as well as quercetin and luteolin which were not detected in the fruits of the other species. Flowering quince and berry apple fruits contained significantly more lutein in comparison with other unusual fruit species examined.
