Sweet cherries are second only to blackberries as my favorite fruit. I purchased this tree from Raintree Nursery about eight years ago, I think. I thought I was getting the super dwarfing rootstock, but this is on Gisela 5, which is just a semi-dwarfing rootstock and explains why the tree climbed to fifteen feet in just a few short years while I stood by stunned. I have not had good luck getting any cherries off of this tree. It blooms well every year and appears to set fruit, but some years they all drop off (pollination issue, I guess), and the few years when it really gets a crop of cherries, the birds (or some animal) seem to grab them just before they are ripe enough for humans.

I took the drastic step of cutting the main trunk of the tree way back last year. The tree is more managable now and the sunlight reaches a lot more plants behind it! We’ll see if I get any cherries this year! Here is how the tree looks today.

• 

• 

• 

• 

I will work to find more photos of this tree and add them later. 2020 Goals for the tree are to figure out a way to net the entire tree and keep the cherries to myself.