Cherry-plums and other cherries

13 years ago

This past spring was a severe test of ornamental and fruit plants. Numbers of older Clematis did not return and so is the case with some of my Cherry-plum plants. I had quite nice plants of Sapa and Convoy which I think were on Prunus Bessyi (Western Sandcherry) and they were totally top dead. By this time there are 2 that are showing signs of new shoots so I am hoping they will harden off and make the winter. We have had so much rain though this last several days that it seems likley that there could now be some stem rot take place if it does not dry out.

The Sandcherries on the other hand did well but did not produce more than a few berries.

All Evans Cherry suckers which my brother picked up from a fellow in Edmonton died so that was a total loss.

I did get one good sucker from Carmine Jewel and look forward to it blooming next year. There is a family who operate a booth at our Farmer's Market who use the Carmine Jewel as their feature item in Ice Cream and sell frozen pitted berries as well. They seem to do very well and I hope to drop in and see them this fall yet. I think they are Prairie Sun Orchards.

Carmine Jewel has fostered a marketing organization which you can find at this address.

http://www.cherryproducers.com/index.html

I would be interested in hearing how other growers have done this past summer with producing trees and shrubs.

Here is a link that might be useful: Canadian Cherry Producers

Comments (4)

Konrad___far_north
13 years ago
You can report it to GW...they will get rid of it.

I'm afraid with all the moisture we been getting the hardening off this
fall goes out the window and we will see ALLOT of die back come spring.
I don't think this cherry prairie growing thing is a sure thing.
It's a hit and miss thing...I guess that goes with farming.
Man..some really put allot of investment into this...from game fencing
to harvester etc. I don't think it was a good season here in the prairies
this year.
My Evans did poor, the one's I grafted to pin cherries produced more
then double. Western Sand cherries put on a nice little crop on a couple of 3 year old plants. Cherry plums didn't set fruit, the regular plums like Brook Gold/Red, Patterson's Pride, Sprout Sunshine, Supreme & Pembina put on a little, oh..the Ptiisin did good. Some European, Green Gage, Mirabelle von Nancy, and some Prune plums have surprisingly set a little fruit with low temp at around minus 43 C. last winter.
cmmwiebe
Original Author
13 years ago
"Western Sand cherries put on a nice little crop on a couple of 3 year old plants."
Konrad have you found much in variety of the Western Sandcherry. A number of years ago I tried to collect some different types and did get a couple of green-yellow fruited as well as a very large fruited black(Bert Porters Honeywood Nursery I think or at least I got it there). Since then I have quit growing them for one reason or another but right now I have a plant which I have kept and it is quite upright to 42" tall but has not had fruit on it yet. There was a fellow down in Montana who was part of something called the Western Sandcherry Society which was a rather informal group of interested people but I have also lost contact with him. Sandcherry is not a popular fruit but it does make good jelly and also works good in a fruit soup like the Mennnonites make.
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Thank you for the advice and reassurance :) I tried it last night ... turned out pretty well, if I do say so myself! It is one of my first jams so I was fairly happy that it worked. I made 8 cups of fruit, and only used 1 package of pectin (which is only half what they recommend) but I figured that plums are a high-pectin fruit apparently and can be used without any pectin ... so I only put enough for the cherries. It "set" really well so I guess that was ok. I used basically the recipe I posted above except only 2 cups of sugar. It is certainly sweet enough like that but I was just worried because the sugar is meant to be the preservative, and I wanted there to be enough to be safe to store. If I used 2 cups of sugar with no-sugar-needed pectin and 8 cups of fruit, how long will it last on a shelf? Regular Jams usually seems to last a couple years, would this reduced-sugar option be less? I used allspice which was really nice with the plums and cherries. Tastes more like a fall jam than a summer one but that's ok ... it will keep till then. Next time I will try vanilla, that sounds incredible too!! Liqueurs are a great idea too, I hadn't even though of that aside from the Red Wine that was in one recipe I found. Thanks! I only had ground allspice but I understand what you mean about the cloudy jam ... mine doesn't seem to be (yet) but I will definitely keep that in mind and look for whole spices that can be removed :) So if I was going to use Sugar instead of Fruit Juice, would I just substitute it 1:1 Cup? The cherries seemed to be juicy enough without much added liquid so I don't think I'd need the juice for liquid. Next up (tonight hopefully) is Raspberry - Lemon Jam. Again, high pectin fruits so will try using 8 cups of fruit and only 1 pkg of no-sugar-needed pectin with 2 cups of sugar. Raspberries are pretty juicy too, I think.
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Konrad___far_north
13 years ago
>> have you found much in variety of the Western Sandcherry.This was only my second year of fruit and all cherries had a deep dark
almost black color on several plants. Yes, supposedly a very good jelly
from these fruits!
oilpainter
13 years ago
Sandcherries make absolutely the very best jelly. I miss having them. We had them as a hedge between our garden and lawn. Every spring we lost 1 or 2 from the bark splitting. I suggest that you wrap the trunk in the winter, if you live in zone 3 or colder. Too bad we dodn't think of doing that to ours. The sap freezes and on sunny days it may thaw and it is that that splits the bark.

If anyone wants the recipe for sour cherry jelly let me know and I'll post it. It is not on the certo list of jellies any more.

Cherry-plums and other cherries

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Konrad___far_north

cmmwiebe
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Cherry-plums and other cherries

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Konrad___far_north

cmmwiebeOriginal Author

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