Focus on... Growing cherries

Successful cherry growing is well within your reach and you don’t need a massive garden to reap the juicy rewards. Lucy reveals how to enjoy these lip-smacking summer fruits

- Lucy Chamberlain

CHERRIES are the epitome of a British summer, and life could be a bowl of them if you are living the dream – so how do you get the best from these must-grow trees?

In the early 20th century, you would have needed a huge garden in order to grow cherry trees – but with the introduction of self-fertile cherry ‘Stella’ in 1968, this all changed. Until this point, cherry pollination had been a bit of a conundrum, with self-incompatibility compounded further by incompatibility between varieties. Thank goodness for Canada! This is where ‘Stella’ and many other self-fertile varieties (such as ‘Sunburst’ and ‘Lapins’) were bred. 

The UK, too, has introduced varieties that are better suited to our inclement climate (such as ‘Summer Sun’, see next page), meaning that cherry success is more of a guarantee for British gardens.

Just be sure to position your tree in a sheltered, sunny spot so that bees can access the blooms and cold temperatures (which cause premature fruit drop) are kept to a minimum.

Small is beautiful

Rootstocks, too, were a problem of old. Trees were commonly grafted onto Colt rootstock or Prunus avium, giving huge trees that required ladders to gather the harvests. Nowadays, gardeners can opt for the far more dwarfing Gisela series. This revolutionised commercial growing, allowing nurseries to grow trees under nets and plastic sheets so as to protect against birds and skin splitting (caused by rain).