Cherries 2022

Lots of little Morello cherries in there, June 2022

I've just started picking this year's harvest of Morello cherries, pictured above.  I scrounged the net from an abandoned allotment two years ago and it's done wonders for keeping the birds off.  I have some other bird netting which prevents birds entering, but the gaps in the weave are large enough for them to peck through quite easily--I needed to erect a little structure around the tree to make sure the netting wasn't too close to the fruit.  But with this netting, I can just wrap it around quickly and easily and not worry about losing any cherries.
I planted the Morello cherry tree when the son was just a baby so it's about as old as he is:  12.  

I have two younger trees, both sweet cherries:  a Kordia and a Stella.  The Kordia has been around longer than the Stella and is fairly tall (the Morello is a mini-dwarf).  We've never had many fruits off Kordia:  it's too big to net so the birds get most of them.  Although it was covered in blossom this spring, it's shed a lot of immature cherries so we still probably won't get very many.

Stella cherry, not doing so well, June 2022

The Stella has been in place only a few years and again, no real cherry harvest off it yet.  It's badly affected by blackfly this year--the sparrows helped Kordia recover from them a few years ago, but it looks like they're not stepping up yet for poor Stella.  It formed some cherries but most have dropped off before ripening.  I'll leave it alone for now in the hopes the local birds will do something about it.  It was only a £5 tree (from the supermarket)--not a huge loss though I hope it will survive.

Morellos are acid cherries, best used in cooking.  I found a bag of last year's in the bottom of the freezer the other day!  I've started freezing the new batch too and once they are all collected I might make a giant cherry pie.