Its not like we did a scientific study on the matter but the discussion was around this point. Also Prunus salicina appears to be 4 distinct genetic populations making the Asian question even more complicated.
Asian / European plum grafting compatibility - General Fruit Growing - Growing Fruit
I have two sweet cherry trees of unknown variety. They are roughly 100’ apart and separated by other blossoming trees, as well as elevation difference. They are 8-10 years old, and blossom profusely but hardly set fruit ( generally around 10 cherries per year, though this past year, with the bad spring, there are zero. ) I want to purchase a mature pollinator so that I can possibly have fruit next year. I do not want to wait on a bare root tree, or grafts, to establish for another 2-3 years before they will blossom. However, local garden centers generally do not have varieties that are obviously different ( such as yellowish or black cherries ) and I do not want to purchase the same variety ( they may very well both be the same varieties, though one has bark that is more silvery/gray, and the other more towards light brown ). I cannot remember how the fruit looked. I believe they were red, but not dark red or yellow red. However, they may have never been given adequate time to ripen before others picked them off. Given that these cherries hardly produce, if at all, what are the chances that they are self-pollinating varieties? If not self-pollinating, I can at least consider a few varieties local nurseries tend to carry. Are Bing cherries always dark red or do they darken as they ripen?
multiple factors could lead to your poor production.
How far away would the other nearest cherry tree be? (neighbours)
Since you did get a few cherries, it could be that pollination is not the problem.
And if pollination is the problem you should either lookup the S allele of your current varieties. Or plant a self fertile one (broken S4)
you could also consider grafting a branch of a pollinator in your mature tree’s. that might even give some flowers next spring. But definitely the spring afterwards if you graft now.
I would plant a Van and or Rainier cherry. Van is common cross pollinator for Bing and self fertile so its not likely what you have now and Rainier is yellow red and visually different and about my favorite cherry. Your still looking at 2-3 years for size and flower quantity to get up to snuff.
I don’t believe any of my neighbors have cherry trees, or fruit trees in general, and the properties are semi-separated by wooded areas.
I plan to graft to each of the existing trees regardless. I was really hoping to this year but could not find any scion wood from an obviously different variety. Is it worth attempting a T-bud graft from one tree to another, at this time? Will it have blossom next spring? I am likely going to purchase a bare root white gold, and govenor woods ( if I can find it instock ) but some companies wont send out trees until they are past their blooming date.
One supplier offers larger “fruiting size” trees, at a premium price. I inquired whether they are branched at all, or all pruned off, what root stock used, etc. but they could not provide me a straight answer…
I’m hoping to find a rainier locally. Though, I haven’t seen one at a garden center yet. Regardless, the local trees are $100+ each. Though, they are nicely shaped and with 1.5" calipers. I just hate to purchase a variety that I already have, by chance.
cherry grafts done now, have a chance of forming a few blossoms at the bottom of the new growing shoot next season. Especially when grafted on a mature already flowering tree.
your tree’s are not that far apart though. So i doubt grafting a scion of each to the other will yield improvements.
Best to find scionwood of a self pollinating cultivar. One with the mutated S4 allele
from this topic
might be usefull
pages 30 and 31 list a lot of the self fertile cherry’s. Most have a mutated S4. But it seems they have also found/made some with S3’ or S5’
I’m curious how those arose. If they where made by irradiating pollen or where found naturally.
Do you know if you cherry trees are early, mid or late bloomers?
If it were me, I would pick two self fruitful varieties as they are universal pollination partners.
Lapins is early, White Gold and Sweet Heart are early to mid season. Black Gold for late season. Picking two of these self fruitful will guarantee you to have cherries and very likely cross-pollinate your existing trees.
This article may be helpful to you.
http://treefruit.wsu.edu/web-article/sweet-cherry-pollination/?print-view=true
yes it was radiation-induced mutations done in the 50s, I think at least for s3’ and s4’ those mutations have been carried forward through regular breeding since then. not sure about s5’. see this paper which I found this after reading the Long, Long, Kaiser book “sweet cherries”
“Structure of the incompatibility gene” D Lewis & Leslie K Crowe, Heredity (1954)
https://www.nature.com/articles/hdy195438
They bloom Towards the end of April, is that considered early?
Local garden center has Van Cherry available. Is it self fertile? It is listed as both self fertile, and requiring a pollinator on different sites…
I usually trust a university article like the one I posted more than info from nurseries (often copy from one another and if it was inaccurate, they keep being inaccurate). Washington State puts Van as self-incompatible.
I do not know if April is early, mid or late for you. You will have to compare yours with other cherries locally. Maybe, your local nursery that sells cherry trees could tell?
if you go to the document i posted
Van S1 S3 II CA Empress Eugenie open pollinated
Van is not self fruitful.
The document i posted is from a cherry research/breeding institution. Compiled from genetic/university study’s.
So variety must have S4 to be self fertile?
Is there a legend that explains what each S# or combination thereof equates to?
Governor wood does not appear to be listed with S#, but it is also indicated as self fertile on suppliers…?
cherry pollination is a little more complicated than most other fruits.
There are different allele’s that cause self infertility. Those are named S3, S4 etc
Each tree has a Pair. Like S4S5 for example. And can’t set fruit when pollinated from S4 or S5 pollen.
However if you plant a S3S4 tree near for example an S4S5 tree. Half the pollen will have the S3 allele and the other half the S4 allele. Since pollen only carry half the genetic code of the parent. And thus half the pollen can fertilize the tree.
The S3S4 tree can set fruit from the S5 pollen. And the S4S5 tree can set fruit from the S3 pollen. This usually is enough for a good fruit load.
However they irradiated some cherry’s till the S4 allele broke. And it thus no longer fulfils it’s function of avoiding self fertilization. We denote the “broken” S allele’s with an ’ like S4’ for example.
So not all S4Sx cherries are self fertile. But all S4’Sx are. Same for cherries containing S3’ and S5’ although there seem to be way less of those.
it is explained in part in this document. that i posted before.
page 30 lists universal donor’s. Those have and unique S allele combination. That no other variety has (maybe future Varity will have)
And thus if you plant 2 cherries that flower around the same time. And 1 variety is of page 30, both can be successfully pollinated.
for example Antuono S10S16 is such an universal donor. There are other cherry variety’s with S10 and others with S16. But none (yet) with both. So if you pick any other cherry, at least half the pollen will be compatible.
Then page 31 and 32 list the self compatible cherries. Those have a “broken” S allele. And thus the S allele no longer blocks self fertilization.
in this topic. i posted a few other links about cherry S allele. You’ll have to buy the articles or use sci-hub or an university library to read them though. There it is explained a little bit more elaborately.
however since your tree’s had some cherries. I think pollen incompatibility is likely not your problem. It might be poor pollination due to whether or lack of pollinators. (although it could have been that your tree’s are the same S combination, and you got lucky once from an insect coming from another cherry tree far away
That’s interesting that the S4 allele broke due to irradiation to cause self-fertility.
I think the main problem with the pollination could be the separation between the trees. I primarily have mason bees ( my understanding is that they wont travel as far as honey bees) at the time of blooming, and there is no clear path to the trees. They are separated by a somewhat steep 8’ elevation change, about 100 ft distance, and dense foliage from other trees that block the view of one another, and that also have heavy amounts of blooms to distract the pollinators.
An insect coming from far is a possibility, as there was apparently several other cherry trees at a neighbors ( approx 500’ away) several years ago but have since been removed.
Not a question but a great video!
Nebraska retiree uses earths’s heat to grow oranges in snow - YouTube
Thank you Luis for posting this. Very interesting. Now I know what I want to do when I am retired😂
if seen that movie before. It’s awesome. If been making plans for such an underground/thermal mass greenhouse for a while now. Quite a lot of physics goes into making such a plan.
In china they are used quite a lot for year round vegetable production.
see for example
if not seen total internal reflection angle mentioned a lot. But i guess if you use a diffuse plastic that matters less.
And i plan to build one some day, and use (IBC) totes, filled with water as a thermal mass. To bridge cloudy dark winter weeks.
And maybe even build a rocket stove inside. (possible connected with a heat exchanger (copper pipe) to the IBC tote)
if also been contemplating making it a dubbel wall. ~6-8 " thick between plastic.
Or possibly an IR reflective (like Mylar) movable “curtain” for at night. To not loose so much heat to radiative cooling.
It’s a great inspiration for people planing to grow fruit trees and vegetables on snow areas! Thank’s! 
This shows the different color of the cherry tree bark, and viewing from the silver tree to the direction of the brown tree, and viewing from the brown tree up towards the direction of the silver tree.
Does anyone know of a supplier that sells first year fruiting-sized Lapins or White Gold cherry tree?
I recently discovered I have wild red currants growing everywhere in my grove, good news at first because I would like to try using them. However, I have planted around 100 white pine as part of my windbreak and learned all about white pine blister on a thread on this forum recently, now I’m contemplating spraying all of the currants with roundup. Would rather give them up than all of the time invested in my windbreak. Should I spray or is the risk of the disease really low for me? I’m zone 4 NW Iowa, my grove is an island about a half mile from the nearest bush or tree. All corn and soybeans in this area. According to an ia state article it says don’t plant them especially black types if next to a large number of white pine, but probably OK for most Iowa gardeners…