My little 1 acre lot is surrounded by fairly big mazzard cherry (prunus avium) trees (they play havoc with my pool each year when they drop fruit). I have a location that used to have a couple white pines on it that about six cherry trees volunteered and grew to 2-6 inch trunk. See picture. I wanted to thin them out to just a couple but started reading about grafting sweet and sour cherry onto them (cutting tree down to around 2-3 foot stump in the process). I have six trees in this spot and thought to take them all down next spring to 2-3 feet and graft 4-6 scion on each. Mix of sweet and sour. Depending on how they take, I would select at most three trees from the group (the three strongest) and remove the rest. I would then end up with a nice cluster of good cherries in my back yard proper.
I am looking for opinions and advice as to varieties and general approach. I am in Loudoun County, Virginia (Zone 7a) and prefer to spray as little as possible. The mazzards do well although I don’t like them taste-wise. I know they sometimes get maggots of some kind.
Thanks for input.
Eric
