Spring is coming - a long-awaited time for summer residents and gardeners. Blooming cherry orchards or single plantings of cherry blossoms turn into a large white bouquet. Luxurious cherry blossoms are reassuring with a large harvest, but often quite the opposite. The beautiful and abundant cherry blossoms have ceased to bear fruit. But before, one tree could collect so many berries that it was enough for conservation and for the whole family to eat.
Is it possible to save a cherry if it does not bear fruit? Of course, experienced gardeners are aware of various methods and techniques that can help improve fruiting. You need to try them all and choose the best technique for your tree.
1. Diversify varieties
Most cherry varieties do not bear fruit due to self-fertility. If pollination of flowers occurs with pollen from trees of the same variety or only from their own, then a scanty harvest can be expected, about five percent of the possible.
Very often, summer residents share their seedlings with each other, and as a result, trees of only one variety will grow on all plots. To increase the yield of cherries, it is necessary to diversify its varieties. The more new varieties there are, the more opportunities for cross-pollination, and therefore for a bountiful harvest. Be sure to purchase self-fertile seedlings. This is one way to improve the fruiting of cherries.
2. Protect the kidneys from freezing
With our capricious climate, this technique cannot be called simple. Very often the weather presents us with surprises in the form of a sharp temperature drop. The sun was just warming up, when suddenly frost and blizzard. For fruit trees, such differences are a real test of strength.
In winter, when the buds on the trees are dormant, there will be no harm from frost. Much more dangerous is the effect of frost on delicate buds in the autumn - spring period. It is at this time that the trees need our protection. What can a gardener do on his site?
In the autumn period (October - November), you should not use fertilizing with a high nitrogen content. Such fertilizers will serve fruit trees a disservice during the frost period. They can cause buds to freeze on cherry trees. The same harm will be from watering, it is better to completely exclude them.
Many trees easily come to life in early spring with the first rays of the sun. But there is always a threat of spring frosts. You can try to slow down the beginning of flowering for a while. To do this, you need to fill the trunks with snow, and sprinkle with straw or other mulch on top. Mulch will delay the melting of snow, which will keep the soil from heating up. And in cold soil, cherry blossoms will not start. This will make it possible to calmly survive the frost.
If forecasters warn of freezing temperatures at night, and the trees are already in bloom, then it is necessary to insulate them with a covering material. And in the evening, every tree must be watered abundantly.
Do not forget about preventive measures. Stimulants "Novosila" and "Epin - extra" are used shortly before the expected frost.Spraying trees with these preparations will improve the cherry's resistance to dangerous weather changes.
3. Attract pollinating insects
Recently, summer residents have noticed a significant decrease in the number of bees and other insects that carry pollen. Earlier, during active flowering, the whole tree seemed to buzz from a large number of pollinators. But experienced gardeners have learned to cope with this problem as well.
In order to attract a large number of bees and bumblebees to your garden, you need to spray the flowering trees with sweet water. Such a solution is not difficult to prepare. You need to take one liter of water and stir a tablespoon of honey (or twenty grams of sugar) in it.
Even before flowering, during budding, you can spray with stimulants "Bud" or "Ovary". With their help, the ovary will be larger, even with an insufficient number of insects - pollinators.
4. Water
Correct and timely watering for cherries will be the key to the future harvest. Throughout the season, cherry trees are watered three times:
- During the period of growth and development of shoots (around the end of May)
- A couple of weeks before harvest
- Immediately after picking berries
Cherries love abundant watering. Taking into account the weather conditions, up to six buckets of water can be poured under each tree. We remind you that cherry trees are not watered in autumn due to the danger of frost.
If for some reason there is no way to water the cherries, then mulching the soil will come to the rescue. When the snow melts in the spring, the tree trunks must be loosened up and covered with a five-centimeter layer of mulch. This technique will ensure that the soil is moist for a long time.
5. Feed
In the first two years of a cherry seedling's life, top dressing is not used. The first top dressing can be added to the soil in the third year of the tree's development.
For example, nitrogen fertilizers are applied twice a season after the beginning of flowering (after 10 days for the first time, and after another 15 days for the second time). During the second watering, you can add an ash tincture to the water. Complex fertilizers are applied to the ground while digging up the soil in the trunks for the winter. Humus is suitable as an organic fertilizer for cherries.
And some innovator gardeners recommend mixing the soil in near-trunk circles with powdered egg shells and chalk. You can bury metal waste in the form of wires of different metals or rusty cans near the tree.
We wish your garden only bountiful harvests!
