2022 SoCal cherry observations and tests

Im not seeing pollen like I do on other fruit trees. Made a post here: Do Cherry Blossoms have a lot of pollen? Bees do not seem interested - #6 by steveb4

I got bees! They have been very busy on the cherry flowers the past few days. Several possibilities:

  1. I got rid of the ants.
  2. There was an old hive that the bees abandoned last month (or died), but left the honey. The yard had hardly any bees. I opened the comb and put it in the center of the cherry orchard. That day there were hundreds of bees on the comb, and they started visiting the cherries too. It is possible there was a pheromone they release, like they do for stinging. Maybe they released the “sweet! Lots of sugary sweetness!” pheromone and then they were more interested in the flowers.
  3. Maybe the old honeycomb thing was just like Wade Boggs’ socks, post hoc but not propter hoc (after the fact but not caused by the fact). To test that I moved the honeycomb to the plums and pluots, which the bees had been ignoring. The bees stormed the comb, but mostly ignored the plum flowers (maybe a bit more flower visits but not a ton more)

So I am thinking it was killing the ants and maybe also just attracting bees and getting the numbers up so there were more bees around and maybe also the cherry flowers just have more nectar at different times.

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Dormant Royal Rainier on Maxma. Full bloom Royal Rainier on Gisela 6. Gisela causes earlier bloom and thus better overlap of bloom. Confounders would include the possibility that mature trees bloom earlier and Gisela is merely mature faster. Either way it is a better rootstock for So Cal backyard cherry growers who need to move up bloom dates on higher chill cultivars.

Note: Don’t get me wrong. Maxma 14 creates absolutely stunningly beautiful shapes on the full cherry trees, and the size is perfect (maybe 2/3 normal for me). Gisela is better for pushing chill limits on other cultivars to overlap with MR/RL/RC on Maxma 14.

Dormant Coral on Maxma 14 (Royal Rainier tree). Full bloom Coral on Gisela 12 in the background. Why isn’t Gisela more available? I only found it available commercially and fortunately was able to obtain it. But it is harder to find for the backyard grower.

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One possible explanation for challenging cherry production in southern California in addition to chill is pollination. When the blooms are too early, or when they are spread out, the bees may not be as interested.

This is the fruit set on Minnie Royal on gisela. It flowered too early. There was some overlap with Royal Crimson and Royal Lee but just not enough flowers at once. The bees ignored the trees until this week. The fruit set on Minnie Royal is less than ideal, and that which I got was due to hand pollination. But thanks to the bees this week, things look promising for everything else, including Minnie Royal on Maxma 14.

I have to admit, if you are getting Minnie Royal, you may not want that on Gisela in So Cal. It is just too early. Get Minnie Royal on Maxma 14 or Krysmk. This is the exception to my general preference for Gisela.

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I just came back from vacation and took a look a my trees. I still do not see much bee action. The Minnie Lee looks to be done flowering and is leafing out. The Royal Lee is full of blooms. The Minnie Lee has a few Cherries. I did hand pollinate as much as I can so we will see how successful I was. I think I will need to graft a few other low chill varieties to try and maximize the overlap of blooms.



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Congrats on the cherries!

Squeeze a Royal Crimson tree (patented) in there to overlap MR and graft Brooks to overlap Royal Lee. Then you will get even more. Can also use Lapins or Royal Rainier.

In the main cherry growing world the bloom overlap is tighter. In my So Cal yard cherry bloom varies from February to May. Finding pollinizers required trial and error.

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Thanks! I have a Lapins I bought for my mountain cabin. I will get a scion or two from that when it grows some more. I will take a look for a Royal Crimson.

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I am seeming to get a ton of fruit set on some of my test cultivars. We will see if they hold. Brooks and Coral especially. But maybe even others. I am waiting to confirm full fruit size as sometimes you think something is green and alive and then it shrivels and falls.

Are others having an amazing year for cherries?

Are these Burbank cherries going to make it? We will know in a week

Late Duke in full bloom:

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This is Minnie Royal on gisela, hand pollinated without other bee activity. My hand pollination did not work very well! It did rain and hit 28 degrees during bloom, so that may have been part of it too.

Minnie Royal on Maxma 14 set a full crop. Great pollinizers in synch (had graft of Royal Lee) and nearby Brooks and Coral.

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Governor Wood (S3S6) still in bloom. Growing in partial shade. Potential pollination from the end of bloom on Royal Rainier (S1S4) and Lapins (S1S4’) but the trees are scattered and the bees are largely gone.

I noticed the bees ignored the early scattered bloom and are ignoring the late scattered bloom. This year anyway, bees want to see everything blooming at once so they can hop around. This is the problem with So Cal cherries. Yes, you can get overlap with the Zaiger low chill varieties, but if the overlap is marginal, the bees might ignore the trees and then you get nothing. (hand pollinate to verify). It is best with the bloom all at once. How do we do that?

Multigrafts for me seemed to help, as did writing out all the S compatibility alleles and choosing wisely.

Minnie Royal (S4S6) in my yard benefited from Royal Crimson (S3S4’), Royal Lee (S1S3), Brooks (S1S9) and Coral (S1S3).

Royal Lee (S1S3) benefited from Minnie Royal (S4S6), Royal Crimson (S3S4’) Brooks (S1S9), and marginally from Lapins (S1S4’).

Since Royal Crimson is on patent it makes sense to buy those trees and then multigraft the other cultivars. I love Maxma 14 rootstock but I do think that having Brooks and Coral on gisela made them earlier. Otherwise they will bloom 2 weeks later. I am sure this complicates things for the backyard growers.

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Nurseries need to start offering:

Brooks on Gisela 12 or 6
Coral on Gisela 12 or 6
Lapins on Gisela 12 or 6

Royal Crimson on Maxma 14
Minnie Royal on Maxma 14
Royal Lee on Maxma 14

Just sell those, even without explaining why. Encourage all 6. They make pretty trees along a fence. They worked for me and it was not all that cold of a winter (though it started earlier in the fall and we avoided the random very hot winter days)

Maybe it is possible to get fruit set with fewer than these 6 cultivars in San Diego, and maybe this is overkill. But I definitely had success this year and I am thrilled!

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Here is Brooks on Gisela 12:

Here is Coral on Gisela 12:

These were right next to a Minnie Royal on Maxma 14, the cultivar that many complain is too early to pollinize. They all bloomed together. And Minnie Royal is also full of fruit.

Burbank actually set fruit. Wish I grafted more of this.

Kansas Sweet holding its crop:

[edit - later lost majority of crop to yellow drop during heat wave, still have a scant quantity of cherries. Since it is a young tree, I am not too surprised it reserves its energy for growth]

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