Yes, the zones are funky though. I'm in 6A, yet 200 miles north of central Ohio. I guess the "lake effect" accounts for my higher zone. The Great Lakes keeping it warmer than areas without surrounding huge bodies of water. I don't get why Gurney's is in Indiana and the trees are in Ohio? A long way to go for the test plot! I have been getting into the Zaiger hybrids from CA, and those people have shown that most of the ratings are way off, such as chilling hours and such. Growing 1000 hour chill varieties in 200 hour chill area with no problems. As one can read the CA growers even are trying to grow this there. A little extreme, but valuable info from the attempt. Anyway so I'm trying to grow low chill varieties in a higher chill area, and so far so good, they seem to be adapting. I noticed some of the Zaiger products lowered zone requirements Arctic Jay nectarine was lowered to zone 6 from zone 7 recently. I wanted this tree, but didn't get it because of the zone rating and they go and change it on me! I should have ordered it anyway! Carmine Jewel is rated from Zone 3-8, 3-7, and 2-8 depending on the nursery! The University that developed them says they will not really produce till year 5 or 6 and you should get 20 pounds or more in the 5th year. I wish Gurneys would make another video to show us the plant now, as that video is 3 years old.

Hi, Don555 and all -- So to quote Hyacinth Bucket, we are unanimous that CJ and its siblings don't need much care. I, for one, will not water mine again, unless it's really obvious they need it, like if we have super dry weather and their leaves start drooping. Besides 3 CJs, 2 CPs, and 2 Bali Evans, I also bought 2 Meteors from SLN. Their advice on watering is a little different from what I read on this forum. From the SLN handbook: WATERING This is undoubtedly the most important [last three words in italics] aspect in establishing any new tree or shrub. After planting, follow-up watering is a must. We recommend 5-10 gallons of water per tree regularly (regularly might mean daily, three times a week, or a good soaking every weekend) for the entire first growing season; especially during the dry months of late July through mid-September. Rain in the forecast does not excuse you from your watering chores. And so on. Looks like the difference between what's advised here and what's in the handbook may be the needs of new transplants versus established plants. In any case, as Don555 says, these cherries were developed in a semi-arid climate. My area actually gets an average of 37.97 inches of rain per year. It looks like young sour cherries may not need any watering. In my determination to follow the directions in the handbook, I didn't look at them critically. Thanks for bringing the excess watering issue to my attention. Don555, your and everyone's comments are extremely interesting and helpful to me. Bernard

Greetings: Usually when I pit my cherries, I wash them after pitting and then chill in the refrigerator over night and pit them the next day. Cold cherries are not as juicy and pit easier. This year being a poor year for all 3 of my cherries as far as yield (Mesabi, North Star and Surecrop), we picked a bunch of Montmorency the first week in August in Door County of Wisconsin which is a prime tart cherry growing area in the U.S. We were on vacation there and happy to be there during the cherry season. I noticed the growers there commercially harvest with the shaking machines and then have the fruit dump into ice water to chill them before pitting. When we got home from vacation with the cherries, I put mine in the sink with ice water then pitted. It worked really well! A little cold on my fingers picking up the cherries but it was a good tip since I did not have room in the refrigerator to chill them all overnight like I usually do before pitting. My modern plunger type pitter works great but the orange plastic tab that prevents the cherry from falling thru the hole for the pits is wearing out. Can't seem to find a replacement for it. Hate to buy a new pitter because of a worn out piece of plastic. There must be a way to make something that would fit.

To me it looks like blight. This issue seems to occur when the plant is flowering. It can be fungal or bacterial. Bacterial blight is common in many areas and is difficult to control. The plant will look fine until blossom time then shortly afterwards the branches infected thru the flowers will shrivel up. First line of defense is to prune out infected parts of branches to stop the spread. If you prune early you can save some of the branches. Do sterilize your pruners between branch cuts. The next line of defense is to spray the following year while the plant is dormant with copper or chlorothalonil. The 3rd thing to do is spray at white bud stage (when flowers show white but not yet opened). I did all this and it still wiped out my North Star cherry after 3 years. I slowed it down but in the end it won. Now my Surecrop cherry has it. If what you have is blight (bacterial or fungal) I wish you the best trying to control.