New Cherry Tree Pruning

I acquired two new cherry trees, Black tartarian and Ranier, from the box store today. Both are about 6’ tall and 1.25" caliper, with about 2-2 1/2’ of steeply angled scafold higher than i would like. Both are in small pots and have leaves.

I want to train them into an open center with the scaffold starting lower, and plan to keep them no more than 6-8’ high.

My question is, at this point in time, is it safe to chop them down to around 2’?

there’s always a risk, but cherries will normally regrow from old wood, much better than other species. I did exactly this to a similar caliper tree a couple years ago and it worked. it does set the tree back 1-2 years from full production

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