Planting and caring for felt cherries. Felt cherry - cultivation and care, planting, pruning, photo Thick felt cherry

A variety of berry bushes on the plot allows the family to provide a variety of fruits used fresh and canned.

Felt cherry is an unpretentious and frost-resistant culture. Its distribution area is quite large - it can be grown both in warm regions and in Siberia, in the Urals.

For cultivation in the Moscow region, felt cherries are optimally suited, but it is worth knowing that this culture is botanically closer to plum trees, on the basis of which this hybrid was created. All other varieties of cherries should not be used even as rootstocks during grafting, they will not take root.

Felt cherry is small in size and can be used as a hedge along the artificial fences of the site. It turns out both beautiful and useful. Look at the photo of felt cherries in adulthood during the fruiting period:

This material discusses all the secrets of growing felt cherries, both in the Moscow region and in the climatic conditions of the Urals, Siberia and the Volga region.

What and how to do from planting to pruning to get stable high yields of fragrant ripe berries for fresh consumption and canning?

Let's try to understand all these subtleties and secrets.

To begin with - a description of felt cherries and a photo of a shrub

The description of the felt cherry should begin with an indication of the botanical affiliation of the shrub to horticultural crops. In reality, the culture is Chinese wild cherry, a shrub that is abundant in nature in Central China.

Scientists in the process of studying identified a variety in the class of mini cherry shrubs. The Latin name - Prunus tomentosa, refers to the genus "plum".

On the territory of our country, culture appeared at the end of the nineteenth century as a shrub for landscaping park areas.

The conquest of the hearts of gardeners began in the Far East, where felted cherries were grown in gardens precisely as a berry plant. The great Russian breeder Ivan Michurin took an active part in the further spread of culture in the European part of the country.

If you look at the photo of felt cherries, you immediately find an explanation for the peculiar name:

Felt is a small villi that pubescent the trunk, shoots, shrub foliage. In some varieties, even the berries are covered with small villi that protect them from damage during transportation.

For the start of the canning season, this circumstance is an opportunity to temporarily postpone the processing of the resulting crop.

The magnificent decorative properties of graceful foliage, rich green color make it possible to use the shrub as a green fence of the site.

And if we add to this the natural unpretentiousness to the climatic features of the northern regions, then we can say with confidence that the felt cherry is of interest to a wide range of amateur gardeners.

The frost resistance of the culture makes it unnecessary to cover the shoots for the winter. Withstands short-term cooling down to minus 35 degrees Celsius. However, spring return frosts during the period of active flowering also do not cause much harm to the future harvest.

The fruits ripen uniformly and evenly. The height of an adult shrub is approximately 250 cm, in rare cases the shoots are extended up to 3 meters. There is no fall of berries even if they are overripe on the bush. All these circumstances make it possible to time the collection of all ripened fruits by a certain time.

The benefits of felt cherries for human health are undeniable. The pulp contains a huge amount of iron and vitamin C, which helps it to be fully absorbed. In addition, fresh berries contain a large number of variety of B vitamins.

The disadvantages of the shrub in the description can be mentioned that it is important to carry out a regular anti-aging procedure using pruning. Otherwise, the cessation of fruiting begins after 7-8 years.

Planting felt cherry seedlings and caring for them

Properly selected felt cherry seedlings are more than half of future success.

Planting material should be purchased from trusted suppliers who guarantee varietal purity and the complete absence of infection with various bacterial and fungal diseases. With independent reproduction, attention should be paid to the conditions for the formation of the root system.

You can grow seedlings within 1-2 months, depending on environmental conditions.

The easiest way to breed is to select young shoots that bend down to the ground and are fixed with a wire. A small amount of earth is poured from above and watered abundantly with water. From above, you can cover with plastic wrap in order to retain moisture and save yourself from regular watering. The film is pressed against a brick.

In this state, for the formation of a powerful root system on felt cherry seedlings, at least 5 weeks should pass. When the root system becomes sufficiently developed, the shoot is pruned and grown in the same place.

Felt cherries are planted at a permanent place of growth in September. Before the formation of a permanent snow cover, at least 30 days must pass from the moment of planting.

During this period, the seedlings have time to acclimatize in a new place and prepare for wintering. Although in the first year after planting, it is still desirable to build small shelters from coniferous spruce branches or dense burlap.

Proper planting of felt cherry seedlings simplifies their subsequent care, so it is important to know the basic requirements for growing a crop.

It is necessary to choose a suitable place and form the optimal soil structure. This shrub loves well-structured fertile soils in which moisture stagnation is not observed.

The acid-base reaction should be neutral, therefore, on acidic soil, it is better to carry out liming in advance and refrain from group plantings next to coniferous crops.

The lighting of the site is of great importance - felt cherries stretch out during shading, the fruits become smaller and become sour. The pollinator can be another bush of the same crop.

Therefore, it is necessary to plant in pairs in order to avoid the mass fall of flowering buds that have not been cross-pollinated. Self-pollinating varieties have not yet been bred.

Before landing, the site is marked. Bushes should be at a distance of at least one and a half meters from each other.

If a multi-row planting method is used, then up to 3 meters are left between the rows. Planting holes are dug 50 cm deep. The width of the hole is 70 cm.

Drainage of broken bricks is laid at the bottom. Then a layer of organic fertilizer is laid (compost or rotted manure). 500 gr. is added to the topsoil. lime, 100 grams of ammonium nitrate, phosphorus-potassium mixture.

Before planting, felt cherry seedlings are prepared: long roots are cut off, a lobe with a length of no more than 10 cm is formed. Then root system need to be treated with a mixture of clay, growth stimulator and wood ash. After digging, the top layer of soil is compacted, spilled abundantly with water and mulched with rotted sawdust.

The subsequent care of felt cherries includes constant weed control, hilling, loosening the soil and watering during dry periods.

The application of mineral fertilizers is best done in the spring during the period of active flowering. For 1 bush you need 50 gr. nitrogen and potassium and 80 gr. phosphorus.

Organic fertilizers are best applied in the fall after pruning. For each bush over the age of 3 years, it is enough to add 4 buckets of humus and compost. After application, deep loosening of the soil is carried out.

The introduction of lime is advisable to carry out after a chemical analysis of the soil. Without this, it is recommended to make 500 gr. lime 1 time in 3 years.

Proper pruning of felt cherries - in spring or autumn?

Felt cherry pruning is a mandatory event when organizing shrub care starting from the second year of the plant's life.

With the correct formation of the crown, the culture begins to bear fruit from the third year after planting. In autumn or spring, trimming felt cherries on your site depends on the distribution of time for each gardener.

Many do not have time to carry out these procedures during the sowing period, because there are other worries.

To begin with, they cut out extra shoots inside the future crown. You can leave no more than 12 strong branches. In the future, only dying shoots are cut out. Thinning may be required if excessive nitrogen fertilization is applied to the soil.

Varieties of felt cherries suitable for the Moscow region (with photo)

It is not enough to know the basic rules for planting and caring for this, in general, unpretentious culture. It is also necessary to select suitable varieties of felt cherries that will bear fruit steadily for many years.

To begin with, it is worth deciding on the timing of fruiting. Early varieties of felt cherries, photos of which are shown further on the page, are distinguished by friendly ripening of fruits, but they can also be subject to return spring frosts due to early flowering.

Among the early varieties stands out "Natalie", which has a dense massive crown. One bush gives at least 8 kg of rich cherry-colored fruits with a tart taste and a persistent aroma. The fruits can be stored in a basement for six months, which allows you to provide a family with fragrant berries until February.

"Children's" felt cherries for the Moscow region are suitable for more due to the short period of fruit formation. Flowering is observed at the end of May, and already in mid-August, dense sour berries begin to ripen. It differs simply by a gigantic yield, reaching 20 kg from 1 bush.

"Harvest" is distinguished by a paler color of the fruit. But at the same time, its berries are sweeter and more fragrant. Suitable for both long-term storage and fresh canning.

Mid-season varieties of felt cherries for the Moscow region should be chosen taking into account their botanical characteristics. All of them require careful attention to regular watering. Otherwise, the berries become small and sour.

The photo shows the average varieties of felt cherries - these are "Smuglyanka", "White" and "Jubilee":

As soon as my grandchildren and I enter our garden, we are surrounded by sounds and smells. Today it smells like overripe felt cherries. The smell of cherry brings a light breeze along with the tart smell of blossoming hogweed that has grown in neighboring unplowed collective farm fields, and the honey smell of century-old lindens in bloom growing in a village on a hill.

After a July night rain, it smells of wet grass and leaves, as if someone had brewed a vintage green tea. From a pile of branches and mowed grass, which the grandchildren recently removed from the paths, it smells of ripe earth, champignon mushrooms, or rather useful soil actinomycetes.

The breeze from the lake brings noise and splashing of water - these are pikes jumping after dragonflies. We can hear the gentle murmur of a stream flowing from a spring in a small waterfall at the foot of our garden.

A small group of grandchildren huddled together, moving forward through a narrow row of columnar apple trees, then galloped faster across a clearing overgrown with strawberries and flooded with sunlight. It was they who saw bushes with felted cherries, on which, behind an abundance of bright red berries, no leaves were visible.

Grandpa! In our garden, everything sounds beautiful and smells good. But when we left the house and passed by the neighbor's house, the lawn mower rumbled loudly. From it, the wind carried gasoline cinders on us, from the apple tree behind the wire it smelled of karbofos, and opposite the house there was a large pile with rotting wormy apples, and crows croaked on it, - this was rhetorically uttered by the granddaughter, who was not in a hurry for the boys, but walked next to me and just relaxing in our Garden of Eden.

I have always wanted to have cherries in the garden. Or rather a cherry orchard. Such as I saw in the 50s in the suburbs of Odessa, where my mother and my sister brought me to rest on the sea. Huge cherry trees grew in all yards. They did not have time to collect all the cherries, and for a long time they hung in a dense crown, drying out and picking up sweetness. We loved to climb high into the crown and take a mouthful of this unusually tasty berry.

Any attempts to grow sweet cherries in the garden in the Novgorod region ended in failure. Local cherries are bitter, tasteless, bloom profusely, but, apparently, they all come from the same shoot and pollinate poorly. Southern varieties in frequent harsh winters froze to the root. Then fungal diseases were added, and varietal sweet cherries disappeared from my garden.

Why felt cherry from the Far East does not like northern clay

I got carried away with felt cherries. It grew well in many neighbors. The taste from Odessa sweet cherries was different - there was a lack of sourness and aroma, but in the north any berry is tasty and desirable, so our family fell in love with felt cherries.

But in the first garden on clay in the lowland, the felt cherry grew for 3-4 years, and after the first plentiful harvest, it froze and withered. It took me a while to learn all of her secrets.

This plant is native to Asia. Now she is still loved in China, Mongolia, Korea. I had a chance to try an unusual marmalade from this cherry, which is made by Koreans. On the one hand, it is a type of cherry, but it belongs to the genus of plums. Modern varieties differ little from their wild ancestors; in agricultural technology they are less capricious than varietal plums. But it is self-fertile, loves multi-varietal plantings and pollinating insects. Russian mice and hares do not eat it, they are used to young apple trees.

In our new garden on the sand, with an abundance of organic matter, unlike cold clay, felt cherry bushes grew quickly, did not get sick, pleased in favorable frost-free winters and springs with an abundance of beautiful flowers and sweet tasty berries.

Felt cherries have few secrets, but you need to know them

Somehow it turned out by itself that felt cherry is the most productive and unpretentious crop in my garden. And she doesn't have any secrets. If only the soil was not heavy, clayey, with stagnant water in the lowlands, if only there were no frosts over -35ºC in winter, although many lower branches remain under the snow, and we have snowdrifts above a meter, and there are enough berries after any frosty winters. It is a pity that cherry blossoms early, right after the snow melts, when spring frosts are quite frequent and there are few bees.

But the early flowering of cherries is its advantage; in warm spring, the berries ripen immediately after honeysuckle, often before strawberries.

An even more important secret of this crop, which we have learned to use, is its excellent ability to produce the first crop in the third year when planting seeds.

Therefore, at the beginning of summer I visit the gardens of familiar gardeners, pick berries from the most fruitful, sweetest and largest bushes and plant them in my garden. Next spring, the strongest seedlings are planted thickly in a large garden and wait for fruiting. After all, it is very convenient to transplant a seedling with the largest clod of earth from your garden into the garden, transplant it in 10 minutes without damaging the fibrous roots, and such a seedling does not feel the transplant with good watering.

It is easy to dig, thin out plantings in the third year, leaving the most delicious and productive bushes. If you do this constantly, for several generations, then you will select, carry out the selection of felt cherry varieties that are most adapted to your climate. Increase its winter hardiness and disease resistance.

Is it necessary to engage in amateur selection of this crop?

15 years ago, I received a large parcel with seeds of a mixture of varieties created at the Far Eastern Experimental Station (VNIIR) by Academician V.P. Tsarenko. After selecting the best seedlings and replanting seeds every three years, I now have magnificent bushes with large berries in all corners of the garden.

Naturally, it is possible to single out the elite and propagate it no longer with seeds, but with green cuttings.

On the extra roots of felt cherries, in winter, I plant Chinese varietal plums and cherry plums.
I don’t know the best stock, on which plum and cherry plum take root at 100% during winter grafting.
In the spring, when planting, I deepen the grafting site by 7-10 cm into the soil, and after 2-3 years the plum (graft) gives its own roots and forms a tall tree.

Why is my coccomycosis cherry not afraid

I remember the main problem with stone fruits in our gardens. In the middle of the last century, an epidemic of coccomycosis, like cholera, swept through all the gardens of our country. In recent years, an even more terrible “plague” has come - a monilial burn. It is difficult to grow plums and cherries without multiple fast and chorus treatments.

But in my garden, I constantly spray felt, constantly renew plantings on young and disease-resistant seedlings, and this plague and cholera have so far passed my felt cherry. I have never done any chemical treatments.

I advise gardeners to first purchase varietal seedlings in reliable nurseries with a closed root system and plant them early in the spring. So you will immediately get large fruitful varieties. I won’t talk about the varieties, they are well described in the catalogs, and any of them will take root in the garden of both the north and the south.

Felt cherry grows in me, as in the wild

I like to plant felt cherries on the north side, retreating 1.5 meters from the fence or from the row with columnar apple trees. The bright spring sun and withering wind are harmful to this culture. And high snowdrifts behind the fence are useful. The later he wakes up, the less damage will be caused by frost.

I do not dig holes, just a hole where a clod of earth with a root is placed. Never used mineral water, it does not affect the yield. The main thing is not to dry out the ground and mulch with coarse carbonaceous organics in spring and autumn. I don’t fight with grass, in May and June I cut a little with a trimmer line and leave it in place.

I rarely form bushes, let them grow, as in the wild. But every year dry branches from frost holes or branches broken by snow appear, of course, I cut them out. If the bush loses its decorative effect from this, then I remove it. After all, in my garden in a new place, new young healthy and productive bushes of felt cherries are planted and grow every year. Such an interesting and often updated culture.

Children love the flowers and fruits of felt cherries

The bushes are very decorative in spring, blooming like Japanese sakura. Look at three photos, guess where the felt cherry is and where the Japanese sakura is. Do not distinguish!

Therefore, it should be planted in a conspicuous place. For decorative design of the site. It’s a pity, in our frosty zone, growing it for flowering is a lottery. Several severe winters can happen in a row, when only the lower branches covered with snow will bloom.

Tell me, what is the use of cherries for feeding children? If you hear the opinion that it contains less vitamin C than, for example, strawberries or currants and is less useful, do not believe it.

Berries are useful not as separate ingredients, but because they are consumed whole and fresh. This is how nature intended. Tablets with a routine of chokeberry will not do any good, but a fresh berry, touched by frost, is healing for both birds and people in late autumn, when there are no other berries. So cherry is good as the first summer berry after honeysuckle, because strawberries are on the way, which children will eat in baskets.

Start giving your grandchildren a glass of fresh dew-picked cherries in the morning. Or, like us, make yogurt from curdled milk, cherries and mint leaves. And their grateful smiles will dream of you for a long time.

The crown of summer, the felt cherry has ripened. We have harvested the first harvest of healing sweet cherries from our Garden of Eden. They collected everything, then the students began to search on the Internet best recipes the most fragrant and original cherry jams. We bought a small apricot pit from the southerners at the market, then, as always, we cooked three varieties of jam that we liked, and next Saturday we invited our grandchildren to a tasting. This recipe won the most votes.

The recipe for jam in a slow cooker-pressure cooker from felt cherries and strawberries, apricot pits, allspice and cinnamon in redcurrant juice.

• 1 kg felt cherries
• 1 kg sugar
• 150 g strawberries
• 100 g apricot kernels
• allspice and cinnamon to taste
• 200 ml redcurrant juice

I set the mode of frying vegetables, cook sugar syrup, adding sugar to currant juice.
I don’t remove the pits from the cherries and pour them into syrup with apricot kernels, remove the foam after boiling, add spices and close the hermetically with a lid. After 5 minutes, turn off the multicooker. The jam languishes under the lid for an hour, the pressure drops gradually. I pour into 200 ml jars and screw on the lids.

In winter, jam is tempting. Berries and grains float in dense pink jelly. Taste shades of apricot grains, together with the usual cherries and strawberries, are amazing. A reminder of the south is perfect on a winter evening.

Should I plant western cherries in Komsomolsk-on-Amur? Skeptics will reasonably answer: “No!”, they say, in our climate this capricious culture does not take root, and it brings more problems than benefits and joys.

In my opinion, western cherries - ordinary and steppe, on a long stem - planting with us will not be difficult. I want to dispel all the myths associated with cherries and talk about the main agricultural practices that will allow us to successfully grow this valuable fruit tree in our zone of risky agriculture.

Winter hardiness of cherries
They say that cherry is not a winter-hardy crop at all, and with our frosts, strong winds, long winters and short summers, it cannot be grown in any way. I believe that the way out here will be planting cherries obliquely. In autumn, we additionally build a canopy for it, and in winter, snow also covers it from above. Under such a blanket, cherry can withstand even our harsh 40-degree frosts.

Soil and top dressing for cherries
For successful cultivation of cherries, you need to choose the right place for planting it and take care of the soil. Cherries do not do well in damp, heavy, cold soil - they need rich, fertile soil.

Plant cherries in elevated places, where groundwater does not stagnate. Cherry does not need fresh manure, but if you throw humus, superphosphate, a handful of chalk or dolomite, sand, potassium sulfate or ash into the planting hole, then the cherry will thank you for good growth and full development.

See how much the cherry has grown in the first year of planting. If the young tree stretched out at least 20 cm, then you planted it correctly, and the cherry will develop well.

Do not get carried away with fertilizers for cherries - overfed trees will not winter well. But once every 5 years, it would be useful to add 300 g of dolomite or lime per 1 sq. m.

Cherry pollination
In order for the cherry not only to bloom beautifully and please the eye, but also to set fruits and give delicious cherries by autumn, it needs a pollinator variety. The culture is self-fertile, cross-pollinated. Make sure that your site grows several varieties of cherries that bloom at the same time.

If some of your cherries bloom earlier than pollinating varieties, then you can do this: put a plastic bag with holes on several branches of late-ripening varieties - this will speed up flowering and fruit set. When your early varieties bloom, remove the "package" from late cherries, and cross-pollination will occur.

Cherry diseases
Cherries are severely damaged by monilial burn and coccomycosis.

With moniliosis, cherry branches suddenly dry out. It is necessary to treat this fungal disease systemically, with several successive treatments with fungicides. First spray with 3% Bordeaux mixture in April or early May. In this case, it is important to carefully process the entire tree, including the near-trunk circle. Then we spray with Horus before flowering (2-3.5 g per 10 liters of water). Repeat the treatment after 10 days.

In a humid summer, coccomycosis can settle on cherries - also a fungal disease in which red spots appear on the leaves, then the leaves turn yellow and fall off, and in July-August the trees stand bare. I recommend treating cherries like this: in early spring we spray the plant with a 3% Bordeaux mixture, after flowering we repeat the treatment, but already with a 1% solution of Bordeaux mixture, and in early September we spray again with the same solution.

Thanks to these procedures, the leaf apparatus will remain on the trees, which means that the cherry will receive the necessary nutrients and overwinter safely. At the same time, in the fall it will be necessary to remove all the foliage from the near-trunk circle - there are spores of the disease that will wake up in the spring.

Useful properties of cherries
Well, in conclusion, I want to note that cherries have a lot of healing properties. For example, it contains more iron than apples, so it is suitable for the prevention of anemia, especially in childhood. Cherries also contain antioxidants and coumarins - substances that protect against cancer, blood clots, strokes, and heart attacks. Decoctions can be made from cherry branches - they are useful in the treatment of chronic colitis.

Cherry - in this word, fruit luxury, lordly taste and anticipation of the full sun and bliss of summer. And what a pity that a tree that gives birth to marvelous sweet cherries prefers warm climes! Imagine, breeders also thought about it and bred special varieties for Siberia with its sharply continental climate and even for the Far East, blown by the winds of the ocean. The photos attached to the article, provided with the names of the varieties and their descriptions, will help you choose hardy cherries for your garden.

Siberia and the Far East are regions with a very harsh attitude towards southern fruit crops. In cherries under such conditions, skeletal branches, flower buds, and even cambium freeze - a layer of cells due to which the trunk thickens. Therefore, varieties that are bursting with health in the southern gardens are difficult to grow beyond the Urals.

The main condition for the survival of sweet cherries in cold areas is the winter hardiness of flower buds. The efforts of Bryansk breeders, whose varieties are recognized as the best for the north of Russia, were aimed at strengthening this quality. These are Odrinka, Rechitsa, Tyutchevka, Bryansk pink.

A serious disadvantage of sweet cherry, especially for frosty regions, is the tallness of the tree. You have to deal with it by hard crown formation, but not all varieties can withstand heavy pruning. In this regard, the Ovstuzhenka variety is interesting with its “compliance” in relation to the strong shortening of the shoots.

Russian girl Early

If the color of the fruit is fundamental for the gardener, then he has varieties at his disposal:

• red: In memory of Astakhov, Teremoshka, Raditsa;
• pink: Bryansk pink, Pink pearl;
• : Chermashnaya, Zhurba, Drogana yellow.

Important for Siberia is such a characteristic of varieties as precocity. Summer is shortened, sweet cherries need to be poured with sugar and shoots to ripen by winter. Tyutchevka, Symphony, Fatezh are distinguished by good precocity.

Advice. If you doubt the advisability of growing cherries, try planting on the site or find a plant called dog rose in its vicinity. This is a kind of indicator: where such a wild rose blooms and bears fruit well, cherries will succeed there.

How to solve the problem with the self-infertility of cherries

A gardener who has opted for a single variety will make a fatal mistake, since this culture has a bright but unpleasant feature - self-fertility. This means that flowers, for example, Bryanochka, cannot be pollinated by its own pollen, plants of other varieties are required, and two or three at once.

But the difficulties do not end there. Many varieties are mutually sterile: their cross-pollination does not lead to fruit set. This can only be found out by experience, repeatedly planting a variety of varieties nearby. But the gardener does not have time and space for this, therefore it is recommended to plant the already studied Ovstuzhenka, Veda or Iput in a pair with the selected variety, the pollen of which is well compatible with most of the main varieties.

Proper preparation for winter is the basis for the survival of cherries

Accustomed to a mild climate, sweet cherry grows freely, does not limit itself in growth, and is in no hurry to prepare for the cold. Therefore, in autumn, the main concern of the Siberian gardener when working with this crop is to “impress” the tree that there is a difficult period ahead. For this, plants are sharply limited in nitrogen nutrition.

Brianochka

The last top dressing is carried out in May, then only superphosphate. In this mode, the sweet cherry will completely cope with the formation of the crop and the laying of new flower buds, but there will not be enough strength for the autumn shoot formation. In such conditions, already grown shoots will stop growing, begin to lignify, become covered with cork and leave prepared in the winter.

A warm, wet autumn can "deceive" the southern tree, and the sweet cherry will continue to lengthen the branches. In this case, they should be cut with secateurs, depriving the apical cones of growth.

Advice. Purchase seedlings grafted onto a cherry-bird cherry hybrid - cerapadus. They are more hardy, because the roots of the rootstock have inherited from their northern parents the ability to survive in extreme cold.

In the conditions of Siberia and the Far East, it is possible to form a crown of sweet cherries in the form of a low bush or even a stlanets - a strongly inclined, but not horizontal tree. In autumn, the branches of the plant are pressed to the ground and covered with a thick layer of hay or straw. Snow-retaining shields around the garden will additionally warm the tender plant with snow.

In order for such sweet cherries to quickly resume metabolism and begin flowering in the spring, the branches, after being freed from the covering material, are propped up with horns and completely clear the space under them. Black, without a blade of grass, the surface of the earth will begin to accumulate heat and “warm up” the overwintered trees.

Cherries in the garden

Siberian varieties of sweet cherries: the secrets of gardeners

Decades of trial and error in the cultivation of whimsical cherries on Siberian soil have revealed a number of secrets, the use of which will increase the winter hardiness of this crop.

Cherry beyond the Urals is not a fantasy. If you choose the right several pollinated varieties, plant them in the warmest possible place, correctly form the crown, do not overfeed with nitrogen and help to overwinter, it will surely please you with placers of juicy, appetizing fruits.

How to choose a cherry seedling: video

» Varieties of cherries

Felt cherry is a fruit shrub that deserves the close attention of gardeners and breeders. This tree is of East Asian origin and only in the middle of the 20th century was it recognized as a cultivated plant by gardeners in Europe and America. The popularity of felt cherries among gardeners is easily explained - the extraordinary taste of the fruit and the high decorativeness of the bush.

The natural habitat of the felt cherry is the mountain slopes of China, Korea and Mongolia. There are historical facts that representatives of this species were previously found on the southern coast of the Mediterranean Sea. But they did not find recognition among gardeners and were not introduced into culture. According to the assumption due to the low quality of the fruit.

Felt cherry became famous in Russia after I. V. Michurin described it. After experimental plantings and assessment of characteristic features, he noted the importance of this type of cherry for cultivation in fruit horticulture.

Felt cherry is a shrub with several trunks, reaching a height of 1.5 to 2 m and a spreading crown. It is very rare to find tall plants up to 3 m or more. Perennial shoots are light brown, dense and thick. Annual shoots of greenish-brown light with three lateral fruit buds collected. Fruit formations are active for 3-4 years.

A characteristic feature of the shrub is the pubescence of trunks, leaves and fruits. This is the protective function of the plant from the influence of external factors. Hairs (trichomes) reflect the sun's rays, preventing overheating of the shrub. Additionally, this makes the fruits resistant to transportation and storage. Soft light hairs together resemble felt, which explains the species name - felt cherry.

Small oval-shaped leaves with a corrugated surface. In the summer they are painted in a dark green light, in the fall they turn orange. They bloom at the same time as the flowers.

The flowers are pale pink, gradually turning white. The flowering phase begins at the end of May and lasts from 10 to 15 days. During this period, the decorativeness of the shrub reaches its maximum. The flowers, located on a very short stalk, tightly stick around the stems, and the shrub takes the form of a large flowering ball. The flowers tolerate temperatures as low as -3°C.

The fruits of the shrub are polymorphic - they vary greatly in different varieties and seedlings within the species. The average weight of one berry ranges from 1 g to 4.5 g. The color of the fruit is from pink to dark cherry, rarely you can find shrubs with white berries. The flesh is juicy and has a sweet to sweet-sour taste. Inside there is an inseparable small bone.

The fruiting phase of different varieties varies from mid-June to mid-August. On average, it lasts up to 10 days. The stability of the fruit on the branches is high. Depending on the variety, from one bush you can collect from 5.5 kg to 14 kg of berries.

The frost resistance of felt cherries is high - the shrub can withstand temperatures down to -40 ° C. Winter hardiness is average, the weak point of the shrub is the warming of the root neck. Cherry life expectancy is short, from 8 to 10 years.

Description of varieties of felt cherries

For better pollination and a stable annual harvest, several varieties of this species should be planted on the site. An interesting option: by combining varieties with different ripening periods, you can harvest a fresh crop within 40-45 days.

Popular varieties:

• Princess. Compact (1.2-1.5 m) and high-yielding shrub. The fruits ripen in the third decade of July. From one bush you can collect 10 kg of berries. Fruit weight 3-4 g, sweet taste with slight acidity. The fruits ripen after July 20. Advantages: lack of root shoots, resistance to coccomycosis. Disadvantages: self-infertility and instability to moniliosis.
• Firework. Shrub reaching a height of up to 1.6 m. Fruits in early July, berries from 2 to 4 g, sweet taste. Productivity of 11 kg from a bush. A characteristic feature of the berries is a transverse seam on the surface. Advantages: self-fertility and high decorative effect. Disadvantages: susceptibility to moniliosis.
• Story. Low shrub up to 1.3 m. Full ripening of fruits at the end of July. Berries from 3 to 3.5 g, yield up to 10 kg. The taste of berries is sweet and sour. Advantages: winter hardiness, semi-dry separation of fruits. Disadvantages: self-infertility, low resistance to moniliosis, crushing of fruits with a bulky crop.
• Natalie. Vigorous shrub, reaching a height of up to 2 m. The fruits ripen in the period from 10 to 15 July. The average weight of berries is 5 g, the pulp is dense, the taste is sweet and sour. The yield of an adult shrub is 6-7 kg. Life expectancy 18 years. Advantages: the durability of the shrub relative to other varieties of this species. Disadvantages: crushing of fruits at high yields, sensitivity to high humidity.
• Damanka. Vigorous shrub up to 3.2 m in height. The fruits are shiny, almost black in color, weighing about 3 g. The average yield is 8 kg per bush. Full ripening of berries occurs in late July to early August. Advantages: taste qualities of fruits, which are considered the best among the varieties of this species, relative resistance to moniliosis. Disadvantages: Self-infertile, drought sensitive.

cultivation

Despite the species, the felt cherry is genetically very different from the common and steppe cherries, by all indications it is much closer to other crops: plum, apricot and peach.

This feature must be taken into account during the cultivation of shrubs of this species.

Selecting and preparing a landing site

Felt cherry loves intense and diffused light. In thickened plantings or in shaded areas, the shoots are stretched, and fruiting is reduced.

When choosing a landing site, it is important to take into account the main disadvantage of felt cherries - root collar warming.

This damage often occurs in winter when a dense cover of snow falls on the unfrozen ground. If the root collar is damaged, the development of root offspring stops, which leads to the death of the shrub.

Therefore, you need to choose a site on a hill where the snow cover lies in a thin layer. To minimize the risk of warming up in autumn, you need to rake the soil around the root neck to a depth of 7-10 cm and fill the hole with coarse sand.

The shrub develops well in loamy and sandy loamy soils with a light texture and high aeration with a groundwater depth of no more than 3 m. The main roots of the felt cherry are located at a depth of 35 cm, so this soil layer must be structured and rich in nutrients.

The selected area is dug up and at the same time fertilizers are applied for every 1m 2:

• manure or compost 15 kg;
• potassium chloride 120 g;
• superphosphate 250g.

After that, a landing pit is formed with steep walls 50 cm wide and 45 cm deep. The upper part of the soil is set aside for future filling of the pit. The site and the landing pit for spring planting are prepared in the fall, for autumn during the summer.

How to plant and care for a tree seedling in the Moscow region?

Felt cherries can be planted in spring and fall. Given the average winter hardiness of the shrub, experienced gardeners recommend doing this in the spring, when a stable temperature of + 15 ° C is established. In this case, the plant will maximally strengthen the root system and surface covers. This gives more guarantees of survival than when planting in the fall.

For planting choose a seedling up to two years. High-quality planting material - a seedling up to 1 m in height, with a healthy root at least 25 cm in length and with a mass of overgrown roots.

To fill the landing pit you will need:

• manure or compost 3 buckets;
• superphosphate 40 g;
• potassium chloride 20 g;

These components are mixed with the deposited soil. If the acidity level of the soil is high, 300 g of lime should be added to them. A good option is a limestone gravel drainage layer at the bottom of the pit, which will regulate the acidity of the substrate and allow water to drain from the pit. At the bottom of the pit, you need to stick a stake (1.5 m) to tie the seedling. The recommended scheme for planting shrubs is 2x1m.

In the center of the pit, you need to form a mound and spread the roots of the cherry over its surface. It is important that the root neck remains about 5 cm above the ground level. This will protect it from deepening after the soil shrinks. The roots of the seedling are covered with soil mixture and the surface is compacted.

The seedling should be watered with 2-3 buckets of warm water and, after the soil has settled, fill the voids with soil. After that, the near-stem circle is mulched with peat or sawdust.

The aerial part of annual seedlings after planting is shortened by 30 cm. In two-year-old seedlings, up to 6 strong branches are left, shortening them by 1/4.

seedling care

When caring for felt cherries, it is important to remember the weaknesses of the shrub: thickening of the crown, susceptibility to fungal diseases, and underheating of the root system. Otherwise, the cherry is unpretentious and does not require much work from the gardener.

Basic care rules:

• Watering. Irrigation is done only in very dry weather, constantly monitoring the level of humidity.
• Liming. Cherries are sensitive to soil acidity. With a strong deviation from the average alkaline reaction, the metabolism of the shrub is disturbed. This immediately affects fruiting, so liming the soil is carried out every 5 years.
• Disease prevention. Mandatory treatment with fungicides in autumn and spring. This procedure is carried out in September and before bud break in the spring. To do this, the tree is sprayed with Bordeaux liquid.
• Top dressing. In the first two years, the seedling does not need to be fed. Adult shrubs are fed twice a season. In the fall, after harvesting, the following is added to the near-stem circle at the rate of 1 m 2: superphosphate (15 g), potassium chloride (20 g), in the spring before bud break - ammonium nitrate (20 g).
• Preparing for winter. Young seedlings are bent to the ground and covered with spruce branches or straw. The trunk circle is mulched with peat (30 cm).
• Pests. The shrub is rarely affected by pests. The only danger for cherries is the massive damage to the area by aphids and scale insects. In this case, chemical insecticides are used.

An important procedure in growing a shrub is pruning. It must be carried out annually in order to thin the crown.

pruning

Shrubs of all varieties of cherries of this species are prone to crown thickening. This significantly reduces their productivity, so it is imperative to form a crown and maintain an optimal degree of density in the following years.

The formation of the crown of the shrub is carried out in the third year after planting. To do this, you need to choose a sunny day in mid-March, prepare a sharp pruner and garden pitch.

Pruning is carried out before the start of sap flow, which is activated at the beginning of the awakening phase of the kidneys. If these deadlines are missed, it is better to wait until autumn, when the tree goes into a state of relative rest. Otherwise, the shrub will spend energy on repairing injuries, and slow down the development processes. Often, the cherry gets sick.

Pruning steps:

• 10-12 strongest branches are selected;
• diseased, damaged and dry branches are completely removed;
• growths over 50 cm are shortened by 1/4.

In subsequent years, you should always adhere to these parameters, controlling the growth of increments. The task of annual pruning is the maximum access of light to the crown.

As the bush ages, anti-aging pruning is carried out. During this procedure, several side shoots are removed. As a result of this, annual shoots will appear near the cut point. After that, it is necessary to cut off all the old shoots located above them. A similar pruning is carried out to enhance growth and restore frozen bushes.

Sections are made only over developed kidneys at a slight inclination. Thus, water will not accumulate on the cut surface. When removing entire branches, a cut is made along the surface of the annular influx, violation of this rule leads to excessive formation of tops. Large wounds must be covered with a thin layer of garden pitch.

reproduction

Felt cherry is propagated by seeds, cuttings and layering. Each method has its own characteristics, based on which it is necessary to choose the most appropriate option. Reproduction by seeds

When choosing planting material, it is important to pay attention to the condition of the bush. The best seed qualities are the seeds of fully ripened fruits, compact bushes without drooping diseased branches with a shiny healthy bark.

The bones are separated from the pulp, washed with water and dried on a dry surface in a shaded room. After that, they are placed in layers of wet sand and cleaned in a cool room.

Seeds are sown before winter. For this, a ridge of breathable and well-cultivated soil is prepared in advance. Bones are sown in the ground 15 days before frost.

Landing steps:

• on the surface of the ridge, a furrow is formed with a depth of 2 cm and a row spacing of 30 cm;
• the bones are planted together with sand at a distance of 50 cm from each other;
• the surface of crops is mulched with sawdust or peat;
• after the appearance of the fourth leaf, the plants are thinned out, leaving only strong sprouts;
• when the seedlings grow up to 30 cm, pinch 1/3 of the main root;
• until the end of the growing season, three fertilizing with nitrogenous fertilizers is carried out;
• water only in dry weather, twice a week.

The seedling is transplanted to a permanent place after two years. Shrubs planted in this way come into fruition after 4 years.

A feature of the felt cherry is the maximum preservation of the characteristics of the mother plant when propagated by seeds. This property is quite rare and in many cultures it manifests itself only during vegetative propagation.

Propagation by cuttings in autumn and spring

The main vegetative method of propagation of felt cherries is by green cuttings. Planting material is harvested in the first decade of June from young growths, when they reach 15-20 cm.

Steps of the breeding method:

• a stalk with 3-4 buds is cut from the growth;
• the lower cut is made under the kidney, observing a slope angle of 45 °, the upper one above the kidney - horizontally;
• the cuttings are placed for 12 hours in a growth stimulator - a solution of heteroauxin (30 ml) and water (1l);
• in a greenhouse, calcined sand (4-5 cm) is poured onto a layer of rich soil;
• cuttings are planted in the substrate at a distance of 15 cm at an angle of 60 °, leaving two buds on the surface.

The cuttings will take root in 25-30 days. During this period, it is necessary to maintain high humidity in the greenhouse and regularly moisten the substrate. Before planting in a permanent place, the shrub is grown for one year in a greenhouse or on a ridge. With this method of reproduction, the shrub begins to bear fruit after three years.

Growing felt cherries is of interest not only to lovers of high-quality culinary preparations. The fruits of the shrub have high dietary qualities and are successfully used in the treatment of atherosclerosis and hypertension. The shrub is also appreciated by landscape designers, often used in the formation of hedges or as a tapeworm plant.

And finally, a short video on how to care for felt cherries (including burgundy ones) in the Moscow region: