Cherry trees for flower and fruit (Photo by Jane Gates)
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Fruit trees give you a lot of ‘bang for your buck’ They bloom beautifully in the early spring, serve up delicious fruit for the summer and glow in autumn colors before losing their foliage in the fall. The cherry tree is one of the fruit trees that is known for its showy blossoms and its delicious fruit.
In warmer climates, autumn and early winter is the best time to plant a cherry tree because you can often buy them bare-root for the cheapest price and get the best selection of varieties. Bare-root trees are planted when dormant so they will suffer the least bleeding of sap. Of course, your soil cannot be frozen if you want to plant these bare-root trees. Potted trees can be planted at any time of the year, though these, too, are least damaged when dormant. Never plant a fruit tree too deeply. You are safer to plant it a tiny bit higher than the original soil-line (you should be able to see the soil-line color change even on a bare-root tree) than to risk planting it too deep.
Cherry trees require less fussy pruning than many other fruit trees, but prune them in the autumn to keep them well shaped and to cut out any dead wood. Check into what pests are in your area if you plant to grow fruit on your cherry tree as you may need to spray your tree during the dormant seasons to protect it from infestations.
Plant your cherry tree for both flower and fruit. Create a group of trees for a mini orchard or plant a single tree as a focal point. You can find dwarf varieties that only grow to 6 - 7' tall or full sized varieties large enough for a productive shade tree in the garden. Select a variety that does well in your climate. You may even find grafted trees with several varieties of cherry on one tree.
Comments
I hadn't heard of a grafted cherry tree — I wonder if any are hardy for South Dakota.
I love cherry trees. We had them on our farm. We planted some new ones and when they were about 5 ft. tall my niece being the self help kind of kid needed a stick for a marshmallow roast. She was about 5 yrs old. She managed to get a knife, and cut the top of the tree out and striped the leaves, walks over and announces to everyone not to worry about finding her a stick she made her own. My mom just about came unglued when she saw the top of that tree missing. It did live and branched out pretty good, a little on the lopsided end but we got cherries in a year or so and had a laugh off and on over the deal. That was about the same time she found the moonshine in the fridge.
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