Looks like the North Star isn’t wasting any time. It’s putting out flower buds!
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Got a few pictures of my 6th leaf Montmorency yesterday, almost in full bloom…
Montmorency…
Montmorency on the left, Balaton on the right…
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Thanks for the compliment. So far, it’s looking like a good spring for the cherries here. Hoping they crop like last year!.
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Here’s the mother tree. I had some really big grafts growing from it, but cut them back this past winter. Unlike the Gerardi, the grafts to not stay dwarfed.
Here’s a pic of my Northstar- it’s the dead one laying on the ground, with the tree on the left being its replacement (a transplanted Hudson’s Golden Gem on M27). It died last summer, after I grafted a number of sweet and sour cherries to it. I’m more upset about losing the grafts than the tree- I was done with it, as it kept getting brown rot and the fruit wasn’t any better that bush cherries (and probably worse).
Montmorency (from Home Depot in 2013, planted in 2015 after a few years struggling in a pot).
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Looks GREAT! Where you located in 6B?
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Thanks! I’m in eastern PA about a half hour north of Allentown.
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I thought North Star was resistant to brown rot?
If that was resistant, I’d hate to see something susceptible. I often had blossom blight (same organism on flowers) and lost quite a few cherries to it as well. But, it was only 20-30 feet from a TangO peach, which was brown rot central, so the disease pressure was pretty high.
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Geraldi seems to be putting out mulberries. There’s a ton of the suckers coming out of this little stick.
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Geraldi puts out 3-5X as many flowers/berries per foot, compared to other varieties. I took some pics last year and collected stats for a few cultivars.
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How’s the flavor up there for you?
Not bad, but I think Oscar (and maybe Kokuso) were better. Of course if they set 1/5 as many, that could explain the extra sugars. The birds don’t really leave me enough to get a solid sample though.
Here is a picture of a Gerardi Mulberry I received several months ago from Whitman Farms. It is probably 2 ft.
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And here’s mine from Whitman farms after 4 years in the ground. Covered in fruit all over, even up under the leaves where hopefully that won’t be as obvious to the birds. At least the size of these trees is conducive to netting.
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Chad, the Montmorency and Gerardi look really tight up against the house and fence. I’m not exactly sure how you plan on training them, but they may run into problems in the long run.
We have a Montmorency in the front front yard. Currently, branching begins at about 4 feet and the tree is about 6 feet. This the second season growing and it was purchased as a potted tree. I’d like to train it more “tree” like as opposed to having low branching for aesthetic reasons, and to keep branches out of reach from the deer. The tree is currently in full bloom here in 5b as of 5/10. Oddly enough, our Blackgold is blooming concurrently which is pretty cool.
Photos of the Montmorency:
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I’m going to let it fan out, espalier ish. Any forward growing limbs will be allowed. The little stick is trying to push out blooms. The Geraldi will probably be moved if it outgrows its current spot unless I decide to move the autumn olive.
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