Felt cherry, or, as it is also called, Chinese, fell in love with the inhabitants of all Russia. It is decorative, gives high yields of sweet berries, is undemanding in care, resistant to frost - all this allows you to grow varieties in all regions. In addition, this type of cherry begins to bear fruit from the second year after planting, there is no need to wait years for the first harvest. So, today we are getting acquainted with felt cherries. Description, photos and reviews of gardeners are attached. In the same article, you can learn how to properly plant varieties, care rules.
Felt cherry general description
In this form, there are many varieties, the best of which we will meet in the future content. Now we offer to consider a general description and photos of varieties of felt cherries.
This is an openwork low tree, or a shrub, reaching a height of two to three meters. In spring, the branches of this beauty are decorated with orange-white, pink-white or pure white flowers. During the fruiting period, the felt cherry changes its outfit from flowers to berries, which can be both pink and bright red beads. All in all, quite a long time.the plant pleases the eye.
Why felt? The fact is that its shoots, the underside of the leaves, and sometimes the fruits themselves are decorated with gentle light fluff.
This beauty now belongs to the genus of plums. Today, during the period of transition from generation to generation, it is called both cherry and plum. Despite the fact that there is a resemblance to ordinary cherries, it will not work to cross varieties. But with cherry plum, plum and peach - please!
Distribution
Throughout the world, the felt cherry has spread from Southeast Asia, where it grows wild. What is interesting is that in the Far East of Russia, felted cherries are considered real cherries. But oddly enough, many ordinary people do not graft the plant, using it only for decorative purposes. In the gardens of Europe and North America, this is a popular fruit crop, although it appeared there only in the 20th century.
Felt cherry appeared in the European part of Russia thanks to Michurin Ivan Vladimirovich. It was he who first brought the seedling, acclimatized it, and bred the first large-fruited Aldo variety.
Benefits
There are many advantages in the description of felt cherry varieties, these are:
- fruiting and ripening of berries occurs almost two weeks earlier than ordinary cherries;
- tolerates winter and severe frosts well;
- harvest is stable every year;
- decorative plant;
- does not produce root offspring;
- disease resistance.
Also, the beginning of fruiting can be attributed to the advantages - thisthe second year after planting a seedling, or the third or fourth year when growing from seed.
As for the taste, the berries are sweet, very juicy, especially like the taste of children who themselves, without the help of adults, can pick fruits from low bushes.
The average yield of one adult plant is 8 kilograms. But felt cherry reviews say that if you take good care of the bush, the yield is much higher.
A good harvest from a plant can be obtained for 10 years.
Recommendations for planting
According to the timing of flowering felt cherry, reviews of which will be at the end of the article, is divided into early, middle and late varieties. For example, residents of the Moscow region, where flowering begins in mid-May, should not choose early varieties.
If the autumn is long and warm, then the annual shoots of the cherry may not have time to ripen, the growth of which becomes protracted in such a climate. As a result, such shoots freeze and die, but this factor does not affect the quality of the future crop.
Use of fruits and benefits
Photos of felt cherries are available in this article. You can see from them that this is a real decoration of the site! But not only beauty lies in the benefits of the plant. The fruits of felt cherries are used for making juices, compotes, jams, they are also good fresh.
Their benefit lies in the fact that they are recommended for anemia, cardiovascular diseases. In addition, the fruits are widely used in traditional medicine for:
- decreasetemperature;
- appetite increase;
- antiseptic effect;
- mild laxative action;
- prevention of colds and viral diseases.
The best varieties of felt cherries
Let's talk directly about varieties. According to gardeners, the best are:
- Princess. This is a winter-hardy variety, mid-season. The bush is miniature - only up to 1 meter in height, the crown is oval, wide. Despite its modest size, "Tsarevna" is very generous - up to 10 kilograms of crop can be harvested from one plant. The berries are shiny, bright pink, weighing an average of 4 grams. The fruits are rich in vitamins, sweet, juicy.
- Tiana. This is also a miniature bush, resistant to frost, self-fertile. Productivity is high - up to 10 kilograms per plant. The berries are dark pink, wide, oval, weighing an average of 4 grams.
- Children's. Low shrub, early ripe variety. The fruits are bright red, sweet. The plant is resistant to fungal diseases, endures the winter period.
- Autumn Virovskaya. Winter-hardy and drought-resistant grade of average maturing. A bush up to 1.8 meters high, the yield is plentiful. The berries are sweet and sour, juicy, the color is bright red, it can reach burgundy when fully ripe. Berry weight up to 3 grams. The plant is disease resistant.
- Natalie. This is an early ripe variety of felt cherry. The plant endures all hardships - frost and drought, which do not affect the quality and taste of the fruit. Bush height up to 1.8 meters, average berry weight - 4grams. The fruits are juicy, sweet.
- Oceanskaya Virovskaya. This is a late-ripening variety, drought- and frost-resistant. The bush is round, low. From one plant, you can collect up to 10 kilograms of burgundy berries. The palatability is good, the fruits are juicy and sweet and sour.
- Damanka. This is one of the new varieties. Late-ripening, frost-resistant, fruits are large, burgundy, sweet and sour.
- White. This is the only albino variety of its kind. The fruits are white in color, this applies to the skin, and pulp, and bones. The taste is sweet and sour, juicy. The weight of the berry is small, only 2.5 grams, no special advantages were noted. This cherry grows well in the Moscow region. mid-season variety. Gardeners plant this species not so much for food as for an exotic decorative look.
- Alice. This is a mid-season, winter-hardy variety. The yield is high, the berries are large.
Unfortunately, we cannot present all the photos of felt cherry varieties in the review. They are all very similar, only the color of the fruit and the size of the bush itself differ.
Choosing a place to land
You can plant this species both in spring and in autumn. But still, spring planting is preferable before the buds open. In this case, the seedling will have time to get used to the new "place of residence", get stronger, and overwinter more easily. Using our tips, you can easily find the best place for her on your site, where the bush will grow and bear fruit perfectly.
- The place should be open, sunny, with light fertile soil.
- The felt cherry, the photo of which is available in the article, simply does not tolerate acidified soil. A year before the proposed planting, the soil must be limed so that the pH readings are 5, 5-6, 0.
- The place should be such that water does not stagnate, and the close passage of groundwater is simply unacceptable. Felt cherry does not like excess moisture, its aerial part may simply die. There were cases when new shoots grew from the preserved root.
- For a good harvest, it is recommended to plant up to three varieties of felt cherries. You can plant a plum, peach tree, cherry plum or apricot nearby. Varieties of ordinary cherries are not suitable for cross-pollination, this has already been written earlier. Some growers don't know this, and their yields are lower than those planted on re-pollination recommendations.
Boarding rules
Having chosen a suitable site, you need to plant a seedling correctly so that it adapts, gets stronger, and brings its first harvest the next year.
- Dig a half-meter deep hole in the allotted area. It should be about 80 centimeters wide.
- Useful bait should be laid at the bottom, these are: three buckets of humus or compost, a fertile layer of earth, 400 grams of dolomite flour or lime, a tablespoon of superphosphate.
- The seedling should be placed vertically in the hole, sprinkled with earth, without burying the root neck.
- Abundant watering is the first thing you need for a good engraftment. After planting, water with water in an amount of 20 to 40 liters.
- Mulching the soil around the tree,this will help fight weeds and retain moisture during the dry season (although the tree is not afraid of drought, mulching will not hurt).
When planting several seedlings at once, we must not forget about the distance between them, it should be at least 2 meters. This will allow more even distribution of sunlight, avoid darkening and thickening.
Felt cherries need care, like all cultivated plants. It is about him that we will talk further.
Feeding
The plant itself is not particularly picky, but if you want to get maximum yields every year, you need to fertilize every year. how to do it and what is needed?
- After flowering, you need to add from 5 to 7 kilograms of organic matter, 40 grams of potash, 70 phosphorus and 30 grams of nitrogen fertilizers along the edge of the trunk circle. And so under each bush.
- Fertilizers will be much more effective if the soil is limed once every five years. To do this, you need to take 200-300 grams of lime or dolomite flour for each square meter of soil, and apply during the autumn digging.
Cutting
You need to start forming the crown of felt cherries, photos and reviews of which are available in this article, immediately after planting. If the seedling is an annual, then it should be shortened, leaving about 40 centimeters above the ground.
If a seedling of two years old is purchased, then it is cut as follows: leave only 5 or 6 main side branches, shorten them by a quarter. The rest of the branches are cut mercilessly.
Next years needthin out the crown regularly, removing old, weak and dead branches. From the seventh year of life, anti-aging pruning is necessary. Even those old branches that bear fruit well are removed.
Felted cherry is often planted as a decoration - as a hedge along the paths. In this case, it is recommended to cut it to 80 centimeters above the ground.
How to protect cherries from pests?
Plum and cherry aphids, as well as scale insects, are very partial to this type of cherry. If these pests began to attack your beauty, Actellik and Fufanon will help.
Birds also like to taste sweet, juicy fruits. Of course, we will not poison the birds, the blocking net will help us from their attacks.
Diseases that affect felt cherries: leaf spot, gray fruit rot, moniliosis. How to deal with adversity? For the treatment and prevention of diseases, early spring spraying will help:
- The first is held immediately after the snow has melted. A 3% Bordeaux mixture is applied.
- The second spraying is done before the tree begins to bloom. Here the mixture is needed weaker - one percent Bordeaux or copper oxychloride.
After such prevention, not a single "sore" will dare to stick to the bush.
Reproduction
Felt cherries can be propagated on their own, using their own shrubs, or by asking a neighbor in the country to share a piece of his own. How to do it? There are several ways.
- Seed propagation. Such reproduction gives the most persistent offspring that have retained all the main qualities from the mother. Only large, ripe berries are used. Having removed the bone from the berry, it must be placed in wet sawdust or sand to avoid drying out. You need to store the seed there until planting, which is done in the second half of October. To do this, you need to pick up a bed, dig a hole 3 centimeters deep, bury a bone, and mulch the soil with peat on top. The whole subsequent season you need to take care of the sown bones: weed, water, fertilize. If the plants grow up to 60 centimeters before autumn, then you can transplant them to the main place. If not, you'll have to wait another year.
- Propagation by green cuttings is carried out in the last days of July. It is necessary to select a strong shoot, cut it with three internodes. Remove the bottom sheet when planting. You need to land in river sand, mixed in equal proportions with peat. Cover with film to create a greenhouse effect, constantly moisten.
- Reproduction by horizontal layering. You can graft on native seedlings, and on other types of plants: plum, cherry plum, blackthorn. It will not be possible to graft a felt cherry to an ordinary cherry. The ideal time for budding is from mid-July to early August.
Reviews of gardeners
As promised, at the end of the article we will give examples of gardeners' reviews about felt cherries. People who have already dropped her off and got to know her well write the following:
The berries sit well on the branches, even ripe, they do not fall off for about a month. Goodare removed from branches without stalks, so the berries do not need to be cleaned before processing. But, this is bad, because the harvested crop is not stored even in the refrigerator, it needs to be processed as quickly as possible. It is for this reason that felted cherries are not commercially available.
The seeds in the berries are very small, they are quite difficult to move away from the pulp, it is difficult to peel for jam. But the fruits are sweet, the preparation of blanks requires less sugar than those made from ordinary cherries.
The plant is unpretentious, it patiently waits for the owner to cope with his important business and take care of it. Does not dry out and does not drop fruits during drought, which is popular with residents of the southern regions.
In general, in the reviews, mostly only positive comments, there are few comments on the varieties, and even those are not so serious.
