Yes, I did say that.
Brooks is infinitely better than Minnie Royal, Royal Lee, and Royal Crimson.
But infinitely is little , I mean " INFINITELY " .
There is no comparison possible.
Brooks is a super-variety.
From Zaiger’s Royal series, there are truly wonderful varieties such as Royal Helen, Royal Ansel, Royal Edie, Royal Lynn… but Minnie Royal, Royal Lee, and Royal Crimson are very mediocre.
Regards
Jose
I have clay soil here, but it drains well because it’s on a slope. I did find a seller with Coral Champagne.
@Jose-Albacete, what is your definition of mediocre, low brix?
I prefer large cherries, I found some really nice cherries in England. But lately, whatever cherries that I bought from Costco are small. If I have choice I prefer the big cherries, I mean who doesn’t.
Hi again SoCal.
Yes, finding the Coral Champagne variety in any Californian nursery is very easy, since it is a widely cultivated variety in your state.
Probably the nursery will offer you this variety, grafted on Mazzard rootstock and in clay soil I am not sure if it will perform well, and I consider that the Colt rootstock is much more suitable for you.
At this nursery, they have quite a few interesting varieties for you (Brooks, Coral Champagne and others), grafted onto Colt rootstock.
https://burchellnursery.com/rootstock-varieties/2/
Be careful with this, it is very important.
If you buy cherry trees from a nursery, ideally they are single-stem seedlings, unbranched, or two-year-old seedlings, branched from the bottom, and have not been decapitated.
The important thing is that for a good formation of the tree ( formation in KGB systems, or even better the system Spanish Bush), it is necessary to plant the tree and decapitate it about 40 centimeters from the ground, “ALWAYS” leaving below of the cut, at least three buds viable for sprouting.
A cherry tree doing “classical” training pruning, that is, pruning it in winter in a state of dormancy, it is normal to take around 10 years to finish the formation of the tree and its entry into production.
With the new training pruning systems (it is pruned in a vegetative state), the tree will be perfectly formed, it will be very productive, due to the large number of fruitful branches, in just 4 or 5 years.
https://www.cloudmountainfarmcenter.org/education/grow-tips/pruning-dwarf-cherries/
We will talk about formation pruning.
On what basis do I consider a mediocre variety?
When I speak of mediocrity, I mean both the flavor and texture as well as its agronomic behavior (productivity and size of fruit).
As far as flavor is concerned, a cherry must have a minimum of 18°brix and above, a certain balanced acidity, and a powerful cherry flavor. and have a lot of firmness (crunchy on the palate)
Regarding agronomic behavior, I do not like hyper-productive varieties, since when overloading the harvest, a lot of fruit caliber is lost, and it is very bad to harvest.
A fruit size of at least 29-30 mm (equivalent to about 10 grams of weight per cherry) or higher sizes, such as 30-32 mm, and the very fat ones with a size of 32-34 mm
To give you an idea, if the quality scale were this:
Brooks would be on the rung of “very good” varieties.
The Hungarian variety of cherry " Carmen " is the variety of cherry that offers the largest caliber of fruit of the world (from 20 to 35 grams of weight per cherry), and has a good flavor, but its texture is soft, and for this reason is a variety that disappoints.
You have the conditions to grow super-cherries, but you don’t have access to the best low chill varieties.
We will continue with rootstocks.
Regards
Jose
And bush cherries? Like the Romance series, what do you think of them? I do not own one.
Hi Mrs Gibson.
That is Prunus Microcerasus, here they call them " guindas ", there are many varieties, and they are very acidic.
They are used for liquor, or macerated in brandy (homemade grape pomace).
I personally don’t like them
Regards
Jose
That answered my question. It is really not a pie or confiture cherry. thank you!
The carmine jewell make the best sour cherry pie ever tasted! Montmorency is good but carmine jewell pie is gone nearly twice as fast. They are no sweet cherry. Comparing carmine jewell to a bing is like comparing a lemon to an orange. They both have their places as long as you expect what your getting and prepare for it.
Yes, of course you can make sour cherry pie (for lovers of sour flavors), but at that time it’s Sweet Cherries season and cherry pie tastes better with sweet cherries than with sour cherries.
Regards
Jose
Wait a minute, I’m thinking of adding English Morello for sour cherry, not a good idea? I don’t think I can grow Montgomery here.
I don’t think you can grow Montmorency in your zone either. I’m in 9a and my tree has just enough chill hours.
I live many hundreds of miles from any commercial stone fruit growers (zone 9a, south Louisiana) . My only information source (before this forum) has been internet searches. The local horticulturalists have no experience in growing stone fruit.
The only varieties of low chill cherries I was able to find available through those larger nurseries that appeared in my searches were Minnie Royal, Royal Lee, Royal Crimson, and Lapins…so that is what I bought.
Now I’ve read about other varieties as mentioned by @Jose-Albacete and others. Some are newer products of folks like Zaiger and others.
I am enjoying reading in this thread that there are other, better choices and methods to give growing sweet cherries a try at least even where I live.
Of course for now I have my 4 trees and I’ll do my best to keep them alive before I reevaluate what I will do in the future.
Ideally picking the best rootstock for my location and soil (hot humid summers, acidic soil below the 1 foot or so of fill from my house build), interstem if needed like the Adara mentioned here, and newer promising varieties…assuming I can find them.
It would be nice to use the trees I’ve planted to perhaps top work with some of these other varieties, but I’d imagine many might be still under patent so grafting would be as expensive as buying a new tree. Also wondering if using a portion of the existing planted variety as the interstem grafting point would be or not be a good idea…instead of cutting the trunk below the graft only a few inches above ground.
I’m game for it all really…just here to learn.
I turn 60 this year…I’ve always enjoyed growing vegetables before, but the last several years I’ve moved to fruit trees…so I’m learning a lot.
Phil
EDIT:
Just spoke with Dave Wilson (company) about the low chill sweet cherry varieties. Many of the newer varieties mentioned in this thread are only available to commercial growers, so those appear to be off the shelf for most of us for now…
Just an FYI
I buy whatever root stocks they have.
You might find the OP here interesting. It looks like Morello needs a little less chill hours than Montmorency (which is consistent with what I’ve read) :
Thanks for referring me to the thread. Also Tree of Antiquity lists this cherry for zone 10, which is my zone. I also plan to plant this tree in the shade, since it’s a tart cherry, it doesn’t need a lot of sun, that’s what sweet cherry type would need.
Hello again guys.
I love fruitcakes, my favorites are blueberry, sweet cherry, apple, and peach.
But be careful, because the harvest season for interspecific hybrids has already begun, and with these varieties some really delicious cakes are made.
I have already harvested these varieties
And I will be harvesting interspecific hybrids until the end of the campaign, with the latest variety that is Fall Fiesta in the month of October.
Bella Gold Peacotum will finish ripening in a few days and is delicious.
I will try to talk about rootstocks as soon as possible, since it is an essential topic.
Regards
Jose
Hi guys.
Today I are going to talk about the most important thing before starting a cherry plantation, which is the choice of rootstock.
Be very careful, since the rootstock protects us from soil problems, and not from fungal diseases or other problems that cherry trees may have, which we will talk about later if you are interested.
It is obvious that all of you know what a rootstock is for, which is neither more nor less than to adapt the variety that we want to put in our orchard to our soil conditions, so as not to have problems afterwards.
As I said in a previous message there are 4 important factors, which we have to take into account, in the choice of rootstock for cherry trees, depending on the soil conditions.
These four factors :
look at these images:
These are varieties of cherry trees bought in Italian nurseries grafted on rootstocks not suitable for my land and end up in these conditions.
It must be said that I know in advance what is going to happen to them, but what interests me are the cuttings for grafting these cherry trees, to graft them onto suitable rootstocks for my land.
Rootstock with poor adaptability to heavy (clay) soils, the same as in flooded soils, root suffocation occurs, and there may be root rot problems
Rootstock with poor adaptability to very humid or even flooded soils (a very common problem in the northern states), you know what happens, root suffocation is generated, root rot caused by Phytophthora and sooner or later, death of the tree .
Rootstock with high susceptibility to beetles and other insects wood borers (the Santa Lucia “Prunus Mahaleb” rootstock is pure ragweed for wood borers ).
It is very curious, but we could describe Spain as very similar to the United States regarding soil problems depending on the geographical situation, since I consider that the southern states are more prone to problems of high soil pH and clayey and heavy soils, while that the northern states of the United States have a significant problem with wet or waterlogged soils.
Let’s start with the problems of high Ph soils .
Let’s start by saying that it is quite difficult for a standard cherry rootstock to adapt well to difficult soil conditions “this is a fact”, and we can compare cherry rootstocks with elegant suits, a suit is not the same. standard clothing, than a suit made to measure by a tailor (it’s that simple), so depending on our soil conditions, we must “manufacture” our rootstocks suitable for cherry trees.
In this sense , experience counts a lot in our favor , since almost everyone normally grows stone fruit ( nectarine peach , almond , plum , or apricot ) .
If we observe that, for example, our peach trees do not suffer from any soil problem, the trees develop vigorously, do not suffer from nutritional deficiencies, etc…, the rootstock of these peach trees would be adequate for our cherry trees, to give an example the Lowell rootstock ( is just an example ) .
Lowell is not graft compatible with cherry trees , but that is not a problem and we will talk later about how to make it compatible with cherry trees .
We will see the different types of land, for a correct choice of rootstock
- Soils with a very high Ph , but well drained .
In Europe for this type of soil there are two types of rootstocks that work very well and both are hybrids of almond x peach tree:
In the United States you also have hybrids of both almond x peach tree and plum x peach tree, but in the case at hand, which are well-drained soils, but with a very high ph, without a doubt the most suitable rootstock is Titan
-Titan
As there are comparative studies carried out in Spain, you can see that both GF-677 and Titan support extremely limestone soils with very high Ph levels.
look at this photograph
Therefore, for well-drained soils, but with a very high Ph, Titan will be the best rootstock for our cherry trees.
Let’s go with the second and third problem , heavy soils (clayey soils), and humid soils.
Both types of soil generate the same problem, which is root suffocation, and we are going to see the most interesting rootstocks for these problems.
https://fps.ucdavis.edu/treedetails.cfm?v=1027
https://fps.ucdavis.edu/treedetails.cfm?v=939
https://fps.ucdavis.edu/treedetails.cfm?v=3468
We are going with a problem that the northern states of the United States usually have.
Land with high risk of flooding:
This is really screwed up, and there are only two rootstocks that resist waterlogging for prolonged periods, both Spanish (one selected from the Pollizo plum variety from the Murcia region and another plum x almond hybrid).
It is this variety:
hortsci-article-p1314.pdf (46.8 KB)
It is a true Abrams Tank , which can with everything .
It is resistant to flooded land for long periods of time, resistant to heavy soils, resistant to limestone soils with high Ph, resistant to nematodes, resistant to phytophthora, and other root fungal diseases…hahahahahaha .
A picture is worth a thousand words ( this photograph is very famous , because I use it a lot to show the resistance to waterlogging of the Adesoto rootstock )
Photograph of my friend Peret’s peach orchard, in the Ebro river delta, which floods every year for several months, as you can see.
And the trees are happy on the Adesoto rootstock hahahahaha.
I know that Adesoto 101 Puebla de Soto is not available in the United States, and this worries me, but the second Abrams tank is available in North American nurseries hahahahaha.
The jewel in the crown of the Spanish company Agromillora Iberica
-Rootpack-R
https://www.agromillora.com/es/rootpac-r/
It is tremendously resistant also to flooding
And it’s for sale at Burchell Nursery
And now to finish, let’s go with the last problem.
Rootstock resistant to woodminer larvae.
In Spain there is a beetle that is very harmful (Capnodis Tenebrionis), surely there is also a presence in the United States of this beetle, but I know that there are many other beetles in the Unites Estates , that lay their eggs near the roots, the larvae ascend through the roots to the inside the tree, drilling into the wood and killing the fruit tree.
The chemical fight is ineffective, since it has to be treated with systemic insecticides that are increasingly restricted by the authorities of our different countries.
There is only one totally effective method of fighting, and that is the use of bitter almond tree as a rootstock.
The bitter almond tree has several unpleasant and even deadly substances for the larvaes wood miners.
I have not seen bitter almond in American nurseries, but it should not be hard to come by and it makes a wonderful rootstock in non-irrigated areas for growing cherries.
Obviously , all the rootstocks mentioned in this post are not graft compatible with cherry trees ( except for the Colt rootstock ) , so it is necessary to make them compatible by intermediary grafting of Adara plum or Monrepos plum .
So far we have talked about rootstocks.
In the following message, we will talk about intermediary grafts, to make rootstocks compatible with cherry trees
Regards
Jose
Royal Lee is as good as Brooks in my yard. I have tried Brooks in various California locations. It was my favorite cherry for years but Royal Lee is as good in my location.
I say this because Royal Lee was probably bred with a certain climate in mind, and in that climate, it is phenomenal. High acid, high brix, crisp, large fruit, consistently very productive. No one in Southern California should avoid it over flavor.
Royal Crimson is not very good, I agree there. It is not worth eating most years, for me.
Minnie Royal is very good in my yard. As grown here, no one would reject it over flavor. You do have to let it fully ripen on the tree. It harvests over a whole month. If you grow it in your yard you get to know which to pick each day. Minnie Royal is the first to ripen so it is special. In Southern California you will eat the first Minnie Royal the last week of April.
In southern California, the bloom time tends to be:
Minnie Royal, then Royal Crimson (useful only for pollination) then Royal Lee, then Brooks and Black Pearl.
So Minnie Royal is needed if you want a more full crop of Royal Lee.
I have no interest in winning the argument, but I would hate to think that a Southern California resident would avoid Minnie Royal and Royal Lee over flavor. They are my second favorite harvest (after Blenheim apricots) and something I look forward to every year.
Hi James, welcome to this post.
First of all, thank you for your participation and your experiences with the cherry trees in your orchard.
We are never going to argue, since this is not about seeing who has the longest dick hahahahahahaha, but quite the opposite, which is sharing experiences in our orchards with the different varieties.
I am going to start by saying that when I started with cherry trees years ago , I had " a certain predilection " for obtaining the varieties of the Royal series of zaiger , since the Californian varieties behave very well in my region ( in general terms better than the Canadians , with few exceptions ) .
So that you can see that I speak with a certain criteria, I will tell you the varieties of the Royal series that I have in my orchard :
In terms of flavor and texture, Royal Lee and Minnie Royal are very good, as they have a high brix, and firmness, which makes them very sweet and crunchy tasting cherries, but that is not the problem for me to give them a low rating (compared to other varieties), and you will understand it very quickly.
Data taken from his patents and corroborated by me in my orchard.
Size.—Medium. Comparatively uniform. Average diameter axially 1 inch. Average transversely in suture ⅞ inch. Average weight 9.4 grams. Average weight and size varies slightly with fertility of the soil, amount of fruit set and climatic conditions.
Productivity.—Very productive. Produces adequate fruit set annually.
Flavor.—Good.
Texture.—Firm, crisp.
Brix.—18.2° average.
Size.—Medium to large. Comparatively uniform. Average diameter axially {fraction (15/16)} inch. Average transversely in suture 1 inch. Average weight 9.3 grams. Weight and size varies slightly with soil fertility, crop load and climatic conditions
Productivity.—Productive . produces a heavy crop annually.
Texture.—Very firm.
Flavor.—Very good.
Brix.—17.7° average.
You have to " read between the lines " to fully understand what the breeder is telling us in his patents .
And in both varieties the breeder is telling us that they are medium-sized cherries, with an average weight of 9.5 grams, but now comes the important thing, and that is that the two varieties are “very productive”.
In an orchard like yours, which does not have a large number of early flowering cherry varieties, it is very likely that there will not be strong cross-pollination and the harvests of these two varieties are more contained, and you can be obtained cherries of good quality
But what happens in my orchard?
Well, I have more than 120 varieties of cherry trees, and most of them are early flowering and there is a very high cross pollination, so both varieties overload the harvest a lot, reducing the caliber practically in half, with cherries weighing 5 or 6 grams, and that is not interesting to me (neither to me nor to anyone ).
Now you will see the difference with other varieties of the Royal series, and you will understand it.
Data extracted from their patents
Size.—Large. Average diameter axially 26.2 mm. Average transversely in suture plane 30.9 mm. Average weight 15.6 grams, varies slightly with fertility of the soil, amount of thinning and climatic conditions.
Productivity.—Productive, produces adequate fruit set annually.
Texture.—Firm, meaty.
Flavor.—Very good, a good balance between acid and sugar.
Brix.—Average 21.9°, varies slightly with amount of fruit per tree and climatic conditions.
Size.—Large. Average diameter axially 25.7 mm. Average transversely in suture plane 26.1 mm. Average weight 14.2 grams, average weight varies slightly with fertility of the soil, amount of thinning and climatic conditions.
Productivity.—Productive, produces adequate fruit set annually.
Texture.—Firm, crisp.
Flavor.—Very good, a good balance between acid and sugar.
Brix.—Average 18.2°, varies slightly with amount of fruit per tree and climatic conditions.
Size.—Large. Average diameter axially 26.6 mm. Average transversely in suture plane 31.7 mm. Average weight 14.2 grams. Average weight varies slightly with fertility of the soil, amount of thinning and climatic conditions.
Productivity.—Productive. Produces adequate fruit set annually.
Texture.—Very firm.
Flavor.—Very good, good balance between acid and sugar.
Brix.—Average Brix 18.6°, varies slightly with amount of fruit per tree and climatic conditions.
And with this what does the breeder tell us?
Tha they are, very sweet and firm cherries, large-sized cherries, with an average weight between 14-15 grams per fruit (can be obtained higher sizes in the three varieties), because, as the breeder indicates of the productivity :
— Productive. Produces adequate fruit set annually.
And this must be understood as that they are varieties that are not hyper-productive, nor do they overload the harvest, which is why cherries of the highest quality are obtained.
, so logically Minnie Royal , and Royal Lee , are not comparable to other varieties of the Royal series , or to other Low Chill varieties like the ones I mentioned in previous messages .
I insist that it is tremendously unfortunate that being North American the breeders of most of the good varieties of " top quality " cherries , you as fans do not have access to buy them in nurseries ( it is very sad ) .
Take a look at some European nurseries where I usually buy (they sell to hobbyists without problems)
https://battistinivivai.com/en/fruit-plants/cherry
https://vivaizanzi.it/en/product-category/cherry/
and many more
Regards
Jose
Good explanation. This is correct. My harvests are light, and that is probably why they are higher quality.
I went to a U pick cherry orchard in Southern California where they overcropped this year and the cherries were not good at all - even great cultivars were too small and insipid flavor. That illustrates the same point you make about overcropping.
Good to know, I called them and they said they are loaded.
