How to Harvest and Protect Cherry Trees

Cherries are ripe when they reach their full red color.

Cherries are deciduous trees that produce both sweet and sour drupes depending on the variety. Sweet cherry trees are the most common, making fruit you can savor plain, while sour cherries, with a few exceptions, are flavorful when mixed with sugar for pies, jams and pastry fillings. According to "Sunset Western Garden Book," dwarf cherry trees are easier to grow and harvest. Varieties include Bing, Craig's Crimson and Mona. For a good harvest, protect your cherry trees against pests and disease but also birds, which love to feast on their sweet red berries.

Things You'll Need

• Waterproof blanket
• Netting
• Mulch
• Rake
• White paint

Instructions

1. Plant cherry trees in their ideal climate. Besides not thriving where summers and winters are severe, these trees need a dormant season at temperatures below 45 degrees Fahrenheit.

2. Protect your cherry tree from spring precipitation. Cover your tree with waterproof material if you expect freezing weather after the growing season begins. "Sunset Western Garden Book" also explains that spring rain might damage your cherry crop.

3. Cover your cherry tree with netting. When fruit appears in late spring, birds will promptly eat it if they can reach it.

4. Harvest the fruit after they reach their full color. Cherries are attached to stems, which grow from woody spurs. To pick the fruit, take the stem with it but leave behind the spur so it can produce new cherries the following year. You might have to sample a cherry every day for a few days to decide when the crop is ripe. According to the National Gardening Association, "the sugar content rises dramatically in the last few days of ripening."

5. Mulch around the base of a young cherry tree. It will reduce weeds and grass, which compete with your tree for water and nutrients. If any vegetation sprouts near it, pull it immediately.

6. Control pests and disease. Several problems might affect your cherry tree: Cherry fruit flies, apple maggots, peach borers, brown rot and other insects and diseases could stunt its growth. Each situation will require a different approach. If you notice insect and larva infestations, lack of fruit and other signs of disease, contact your extension office for help identifying and solving the problem.

7. Winterize your cherry tree after it finishes producing fruit for the season. To harden it off, the National Gardening Association suggests you rake the mulch away from the tree and paint its trunk white.

References

• "Sunset Western Garden Book;" Kathleen Norris Brenzel; 2001
• National Gardening Association; "Cherry Care & Harvesting;" National Gardening Association Editors