Yes it’s when the cherries get close to harvest that they are vulnerable to cracking. When cherries are small it’s less of a problem. Also tart will crack too in bad years and I know this from experience. As a home grower you have a couple of options.
First always plant cherries that have some resistance to cracking and/or brown rot. The cracking creates wounds that allows the brown rot to easily get into the fruit. Second space out your maturity dates among your cherry trees. If you have three trees plant a early maturing cherry, a mid season, and a late season maturing cherry. Doing this may allow you to dodge the rain problem. The third option is to do what Clements talks about in his papers…grow the cherry trees in high tunnels. This isn’t practical for most of us. But if you keep the trees small you may be able to cover trees/ground with tarps before a really heavy rainfall. Still not very practical for most of us. Finally, micro-climate makes a difference.
I am fighting cherry leaf spot on my tart cherries too. I thought my neighbor’s tart cherry was causing the problem for me since it’s upwind and he does not spray. I checked his tree and it had no leaf spot. I asked myself why am I spraying and have leaf spot and he has none? Well, I think his tree has better air circulation and is on drier, higher ground…it looks like that makes a difference.
Very good information from you both.
Spreading out the harvest period makes sense. Putting up high tunnels isn’t practical for me either. So what spray do you put on your sour cherries?
While your microclimate theory also makes sense, my whole orchard is planted in top of a hill, no windbreaks, plenty of wind and air circulation! And I still get leaf spot. I have chokecherries growing here, but haven’t seen leaf spot on those. Maybe they could be the carrier?
So I guess I don’t understand what causes cracking. I thought it was rain events during the last 2-3 weeks before harvest?
I was able to find some Jujubes at an international store to taste them. Perhaps, if you have an international store near you, you can check to see if they carry them.
They were okay, not bad, just ok. While I was not super impressed with the flavor, I really feel like I am going to enjoy some of the ones that I ordered better. For one thing, I will be able to try them at different stages. Also, I ordered 6 of the most popular varieties, one of them has to be good, lol. In the end, I’ll be happy to have fruit on the property that have little pest pressure and that are edible.
That’s a good idea, I will try stop into a specialty store next time I am in the city. It would be great to have a fruit that you enjoy and don’t have to work so hard to grow! I hope you like your new ones you purchased. That’s a good point too, @mamuang, if we went solely by grocery store taste, we wouldn’t be as inclined to try grow most fruits at home.
On spraying make sure that your water is acidic before adding fungicides. It will make a world of difference. If you are doing this, and still have problems it is time to switch products and use a more effective fungicide. I had a hard drive crash and lost my bookmarks. I’m still rebuilding them. Otherwise I could give you more info.
Check here for commercial fungicide names
I use Captan, boscalid, and propiconazole. Not the most effective, also some resistant strains of leaf spot with boscalid. But boscalid is very effective on brown rot. Boscalid uses a different mode of action than say propiconazole, which also works fairly well on brown rot.
Again you must know exactly what pH is best for your fungicides. Let’s look at Captan
Hours of protection
pH 5 = 32 hrs; pH 7 = 8 hrs; pH 8 = 10 min
myclobutanil
Not affected by pH
propiconazole
Stable at pH 5 – 9
Captan is not even worth using if you have the wrong pH!!!
The others are not as important. Malathion is another that you must spray at 5.0
Yes one should at least use it as a dormant spray. If not copper, try Lime-sulfur.
Also with leaf spot pick up leaves of infected trees and remove! Don’t compost.
