If you want to harvest a lot of sour cherries in summer, you have to take good care of your sour cherry tree. This includes skillful pruning after harvest. When which shoots need to see the scissors depends on whether it is a sweet sour cherry or a morello cherry.
Educational Cut
In the first few years after planting, a framework is built up from a center and around four shoots. Scaffold shoot extensions are shortened by half in the first five years. Wild shoots are completely removed in summer. The sour cherry can also be trained as a shrub. Sour cherries, on the other hand, are less suitable as an espalier tree.
Time and frequency
Sour cherries generally set their flower buds the previous year. Therefore, what all varieties have in common is that blending should take place immediately after harvest. This will promote this year's bud formation. The cutting day should be cloudy but dry. The distances between two pruning measures and which shoots need to be shortened or removed and how depends on which sour cherry group the variety belongs to.
A distinction is made between sweet sour cherries and morello cherries.
ShadowMorelle
Shadow morello cherries such as the varieties 'Gerema' or 'Morellenfeuer' only fruit on annual wood. These are shoots that sprouted the previous year. After the harvest, these long shoots become bare and only form short new shoots at the ends. These new shoots have only a small number of buds in the following year. They also tend to droop a lot. To prevent this from happening, every tree needs heavy pruning every year to form new fruit wood.
Sweet Weichsel
Sweet sour cherries such as the varieties 'Koröser Weichsel' or 'Heimanns Rubinenweichsel' bear fruit on one-year-old shoots, but also on two- and three-year-old shoots. They don't age as quickly as the morello cherry. Sweet sour cherries are therefore only thinned out every two to three years.
Tips for morello cherries
Implementing the following tips will help you get the most out of every cut. With the sour cherry tree it means in plain language: an even richer harvest!
1. Blend as early as possible
After the harvest, you theoretically have a few weeks to carry out the necessary pruning measures. But don't delay the cut for too long. The sooner you grab the scissors, the stronger the new shoots will be. This promises a more abundant cherry harvest.
2. Lighten strongly
Cut most of the harvested long shoots, so-called whip shoots. Only a quarter of their original length should remain.
3. Redirect to new growth
When shortening, redirect each long shoot, if possible, to a freshly sprouted side branch. To do this, place the scissors just above the new growth. Under no circumstances should you prune the new growth itself.
4. Thin out excess shoots
Make sure that no more than three 20-25 cm long annual shoots remain for every 10 cm of branch length. You should completely remove any excess shoots. To do this, select the weakest or most unfavorable growing shoots.
5. Correct steep shoots
Shoots with a vertical growth direction are lazy to bloom. Removing them with scissors is not the only solution. Especially if there are a lot of such shoots on the sour cherry tree, hardly anything would be left after cutting it back.
- Increase angle to guide branch
- Use spreaders, weights or cords
- 60° angle is ideal
- act early
- the younger the branch, the more flexible it is
6. Combining harvest and pruning
Since almost every fruit shoot of the current year has to be shortened anyway, you can combine pruning with the harvest. Cut off whole fruit-bearing branches as needed instead of picking off tart cherries one tart cherry at a time. So after the end of the harvest season there is little left to do.
7. Pull in leading branches
Do you want to prevent the branches from drooping and the crown of your sour cherry from looking like a weeping willow? Then grow leading branches from a few long shoots. Instead of removing three-quarters of the length, cut where new branches are welcome.
8. Ensure good exposure
Over time, the crown of the sour cherry can become so dense that individual branches shade each other. Then you should not only shorten harvested shoots, but also prune perennial branches. This also means the crown is continually rejuvenated.
- not every year, only thin out when necessary
- shorten individual thicker branches
- Select the interface specifically
- always above the base of a younger shoot
- if not possible, cut to Astring
In order to choose exactly the right branches, you should occasionally look at the sour cherry tree from all sides. This way you can ensure that a harmonious crown structure is maintained.
Sweet Weichsel
With sour cherries you will not experience the problem of bald whip shoots. But their fruit wood will be exhausted after three to four years and will no longer bear fruit. That's why regular new growth must be ensured, while worn-out fruit wood must disappear from the tree.
1. Thin out disturbing shoots
First remove all dead and weak shoots. Then all branches that grow unfavorably inwards must be removed.
2. Shorten shoots that are too long
You should shorten fruit shoots that are still usable but very long. This promotes even more new fruit wood in the form of many short shoots.
3. Only cut older fruit wood
Since all shoots in this group can bear a lot of fruit for up to three years, they should be given the chance to do so. It means less pruning work for you, as you mainly have to prune the three-year-old branches.
4. Redirect to younger shoots
Do not completely remove old fruit wood. Redirect it instead. This does not have to be a new shoot like the morello cherry.
- redirect to a younger shoot in the rear area
- this can be a one- or two-year-old shoot
- cut off the old branch just above it
5. Cut steep shoots back to cones
Steep shoots are annoying and do not bear fruit. When it comes to sour cherries, it is best to cut them back to cones. This also applies to disruptive competitive instincts.
Rejuvenation cut
Both morello cherries and sweet sour cherries can age significantly if maintenance cuts are not carried out for a long period of time. Such a sour cherry tree is very branched. Due to the resulting network of branches, only a little light penetrates into the interior of the crown and it becomes bare. Delicious tasting sour cherries are becoming scarce. Since the sour cherry tolerates pruning, such a tree does not have to be abandoned. Heavy pruning must be done between October and the end of February. If the tree is very old, the pruning measures may have to be spread over 2-3 years.
- cutting or sawing dead wood on a branch
- derive strongly branched, hanging branches
- A young side shoot at the base is ideal
Tip:
If an old branch cannot be redirected to a young side shoot, you can cut it back to a 10-15 cm long cone. The following summer, choose two strong, diagonal-horizontal new shoots. Remove remaining shoots and the dried cone.
Pruning a sick sour cherry tree
Regular pruning is also there to prevent diseases such as the dreaded Monilia tip drought. If it has conquered the sour cherry tree anyway, all infected branches must be removed and disposed of as residual waste. These pruning measures allow no delay until the harvest is over.
Tip:
To minimize the risk of transmitting dangerous pathogens, you should disinfect the cutting tools you use before and after each cutting. It should also have sharp blades to ensure smooth cuts.
