Stella Cherry - Does this look normal?

General Fruit Growing
1

Hey everyone, so I’m pretty much a rookie growing a Stella Cherry for the first time and needed some opinions.

Some of my trees have started to leaf out (in spite of chilly, and rainy) weather and my under one year old Stella Cherry looks to be still dormant. Although there is some growth from the base of the tree.

Is this normal, or has my tree croaked and sprung back from the root zone?
And no, we don’t get cold weather so it wasn’t from a cold snap by any means. Also I should have over 1000 chill hours YTD.

IMG_7138
IMG_71383024×4032 2.23 MB
IMG_7139
IMG_71392138×2851 3.99 MB
IMG_7140
IMG_71403024×4032 4.72 MB

1 Like
2

That’s not Stella it is a rootstock sucker. Remove it. Besides that well even with that all looks normal to me.

3 Likes
3

I second Drew. Your Stella’s buds look nice and plump and the graft is still healthy and alive. The rootstock is just more vigorous than the cultivar and wants more photosynthesis going on than the sleepy Stella is providing so it is sending up root sprouts. Just remove them so that the energy gets directed to Stella.

1 Like
4

Thanks guys!
I just wasn’t sure how slow these guys are to wake up. Plus I’ve read they are a very early Cherry, so a little surprised it’s still dormant. I guess upper 50’s - low 60’s and not too much sunlight is not helping.

1 Like
5

A tree will vary dormancy until it is more used to it’s home. It looks fine though and is very alive.

1 Like
6

Your Stella is just a little ahead of mine, but I’m in zone 8a, so it looks good

TFN

1 Like
7

Sweet cherries are about the latest stonefruit to wake up in spring. And the latest to bloom. All that’s good if you get enough chilling and it sounds like you have.

3 Likes
8

Hey everyone, indeed it does look like my fears were premature. Here’s a couple of pics from today.

This tree is on fire!! :fire:

image
image3024×4032 3.02 MB
image
image2138×2851 3.4 MB

4 Likes
9

Nice tree. If not a true dwarfing rootstock, that tree will swallow your house!

10

Stella is supposed to be a compact tree. My friend has one. It is about 8 ft now without pruning.

11

Standard sweet cherries are towering trees

1 Like
12

It is a true dwarfing root stock. It was on the label (escapes me now).

1 Like